from their nature capable of resisting
the effects of alternation of climate for many years. Many of these
corrals are sufficiently spacious to contain three thousand head of
cattle.

When the animal is to be caught for slaughter, the horsemen go in chase,
the one securing it by his lasso over its head and dragging it along,
while the other urges it on with his garrocha till it reaches the
slaughter-post. The first then secures the animal by a few turns of the
lasso round it, while a matador strikes his dagger into the vertebras at
the back of the head, when the animal drops as if struck by an electric
spark.

These wild horsemen, when crossing a river, hesitate not to plunge in,
in spite of the alligators which may be swarming on every side. While
their clothes are carried across in a hide-formed canoe, put together at
the moment, they dash into the stream without clothes or saddles, and
then slipping from the backs of their horses, support themselves on the
animals' haunches with one hand, while they guide them by means of the
halter with the other--their companions on the shore shouting, yelling,
and shaking their ponchos, to drive the rest of the herd into the water.
The caymans, alarmed by the uproar, keep at a distance; but the savage
little caribes frequently attack them, and many thus fall.

Besides cattle, horses, and mules, vast numbers of hogs range over the
plain,--the descendants of those introduced by the early settlers, and
which are now, from their ferocity, and the formidable size of their
tusks, considered foes worthy of the lances of the bold horsemen. These
lances, generally used in hunting, have played no insignificant part in
the hands of the Llaneros, as well as in those of some of the fierce
tribes of the desert, during the civil wars which so long disturbed the
country.

A profusion of fruits in a state of nature grow in the woods and plains.
Among them are several species of wild guavas. Some are of exquisite
flavour and aroma. One sort bears in rich profusion a number of
brilliant scarlet, highly perfumed, and acidulous fruits. There are
various kinds of custard apples, the inside a sweet and highly aromatic
pulp filled with small seeds. Also the madrona, which resembles the
lemon in shape and colour, and filled with a pulp enveloping several
large nuts, the flavour not unlike strawberries. The tree which
produces these fruits attains a height of sixty feet, and has a dense
foli