The chief tribe of Patagonians who inhabit the region as far south as
the Strait of Magellan, go under the name of Pehuenches--men of tall and
muscular stature, with thick black hair, high foreheads, and broad
faces, but in no way approaching to what would be called the gigantic.
Their features express passive contentment, but are utterly destitute of
vivacity and intelligence. Their feet are remarkably small. They have
their eyebrows and moustaches plucked so as to contain only a single
line of hairs. The women are of low size, and unattractive--using a
sort of pigment on their bodies, composed of animal blood and soot.
The sole covering of both sexes is a mantle made of huanacu skins--worn
with the hairy side in--which can be thrown off in a moment. Their
habitations are huts of skin, supported on poles sloping to the ground,
towards the direction from whence blows the strong wind or snow from
Cape Horn. They sleep, however, in fine weather,--like other tribes
further to the north,--on the uncovered ground.
Their great delight is smoking--from a pipe made of stone, fashioned
into the shape of a small bowl, in which a long tube is fixed. Each man
takes a pull at the pipe and sends it round, gulping in a huge quantity
of vapour, all the muscles of the body seeming in a fierce convulsion of
straining; and while his neighbour is apparently employed in an effort
to gulp down the whole apparatus, there issues from the nose and mouth
of the first smoker a cloud which quickly renders his face and all
around him invisible.
Like other tribes of the Pampas, they have become expert horsemen, and
with bolas capture huanacus and ostriches.