"I'm--done for," he panted. "You must go on--and send help back." "No, no, give me your hand," cried his elder daughter. "Look; look behind you!" He obeyed. The two foremost Indians had abandoned their horses and come within gunshot; and one was coolly taking aim at them with his musket. "Only another minute or two," said the girl soothingly. "Where are you going? Where are you going?" cried a voice in Spanish. They were running exactly parallel to the river, but about thirty yards from the water-edge. Looking to their left they saw for the first time that one of the brig's boats had drawn up as close as possible to the bank and that her coxswain was beckoning to them. They needed no further warning, but made a dash for the boat. As they did so a bullet whistled past their ears, and the younger girl sank down on the dry grass. "She is wounded; she is killed," shouted Postlethwaite. "No, Señor; only faint and frightened," panted the stalwart cook, and, hastily picking his young mistress up in his arms, he caught up the others, who were dragged on board as a second bullet flew over their heads. Juan handed in his burden and was about to vault over the gunwale, when his foot slipped on the mud and he fell sideways into the water. With drawn swords the two Indians--emissaries of Andresito--made a dash at him, but were kept aloof by oars and boat-stretchers; and as one of them drew a pistol, Juan's fellow-servant did likewise and sent a bullet through his arm, just as the plucky cook was dragged into safety and the boat pushed into the stream. Not long afterwards a strong Portuguese force drove the Guaycurus out of Corrientes and took Andresito prisoner. He was conveyed to the coast and eventually liberated; but he died not long after, and with him the hopes of independence which the Guaranian Indians had been cherishing. CHAPTER III A CAPTIVE AMONG ARGENTINE INDIANS Till the beginning of the nineteenth century, the Guaranian Indians (with the Abipons and other sub-tribes) were in possession of a great part of Southern Brazil, Paraguay, and Eastern Argentina. They were one of the strongest of the Indian peoples, unusually tall and athletic, and, so long as they had reliable leaders, well able to hold their own against the Portuguese. But owing to internal dissensions, intermarriages with Europeans, and more especially to the crushing defeat by the colonists, in 1820, of their great chief Andresito Artegas, they had become, by the middle of the century, a negligible quantity.