This was a great grief to his mother; his name was Robert, and he had come out with his parents from Scotland. Mrs. Beatty welcomed us warmly when we arrived. It made quite a small picnic for the children, for she always insisted on their staying to have tea and some of the nice little Scotch cakes she made. So we took the horses out of the carriage, and tied them up under the "euremada," for the sun was now getting to be quite hot after mid-day. Beatty himself was a quiet, rather solemn-looking man, with a red complexion, and sandy-coloured hair. It was pleasant as we returned in the late afternoon, and as we passed along, we saw one of the blue silver foxes some distance ahead of us, already come out of his lair, preparing for an evening stroll. We made too much noise for him, however, and he soon made off, followed in full chase by "Napoleon," but naturally to no purpose. The sun was fast declining when we reached the estancia; however, I was pleased to hear both the ladies and children tell Mr. Jardine, who was in the verandah, they had enjoyed their drive, and had all of them spent a very pleasant afternoon. The next morning we had a heavy thunderstorm, with sharp and continuous flashes of lightning, which lasted upwards of an hour, and was then followed by torrential rain. This went on the greater part of the day. Shearing began on the tenth of November. There was only a small gang of six professional shearers employed. The remainder were made up of natives living in the neighbourhood, of which there were a good many, who not only could shear well, but had been accustomed to come year after year. The "galpon" was not nearly so large as that at the Cerro, in fact the room available was if anything too restricted for the number of sheep which had to be shorn. More time, therefore, was needed to complete the business. On November 20th a spell of bad weather set in which caused delay, as the sheep naturally were wet and could not easily be got dry again. However, a week later it cleared up, and after that work progressed satisfactorily. The shearers were very quiet, and orderly, and although they did not shear very fast, they did their work well. The month of December, however, was half through before the shearing was completed, and the shearers, having received the money due to them, finally took their departure. No festivities took place, as was so often customary at the end of shearing, but it was generally understood that a race or something of the kind would be held later on, probably on one of the days between Christmas and the New Year. John Gordon, the "capataz" of the sheep, had a nice bay horse, about five years old, belonging to himself, which had been born and grown up, and also been tamed on the estancia. His owner considered him to be something of a racer; indeed, had so high an opinion of him, I really believed him to think he would easily run away from anything likely to be put against him.