Whilst waiting for the assembling of the Caciques, the officers devoted two or three days to surveying: following up the Quetro-eique about three and a half leagues, they traced it to its sources on the side of the Ventana. The height of the principal mountain, so called, they determined by measurement to be 2500 feet above the level of the plain from which it rises.[41] To the north-west a chain of low hills extends as far as a break by which they are separated from the minor group called the Curumualá. Through this break run two small streams, the one called Ingles-malhuida, from the circumstance of an Englishman having been put to death by the Indians there, the other Malloleufú, or the White River; the course of both is from south-west to north-east, running nearly parallel with the Quetro-eique, and all, according to the Indian accounts, losing themselves in extensive marshes beyond. The rivers Sauce-grande and Sauce-chico, which fall into Bahia Blanca, rise from the southern declivities of this range, according to the same authority. Beyond the Curumualá is the group of the Guamini, the most westerly part of this range. An observation taken from their tents on the Quetro-eique gave the latitude 37° 50´; longitude from Cadiz 56° 20´; and thence a clear day gave them a general view of the whole range. The Ventana bore south 18° west, prolonging its ramifications to south 40° west. The Curumualá south 60° west, extending to 80°. The Guamini extended through 30° as far as west 10° north. The whole range may be described as running from south-south-east to north-north-west. The variation by repeated calculations was 18° 30´, at the other range it had been found as stated to be 17° 10´, and at the Lake of Polvaderas 16° 30´ east.[42] When the Caciques and their followers were all assembled there might be about 1500 men, who were paraded by their chiefs much in the same manner as before described. The same ceremonies to drive away the gualichú, and the same preliminary discussions amongst themselves, before they commenced their parleys with the officers; and these terminating precisely in the same unsatisfactory and indefinite manner. The presents it was evident were the only objects contemplated by the savages, and, when these were not produced quite so quickly as they expected, an attempt was made to seize them by force, and the officers themselves would have been stripped, if not sacrificed, had not old Lincon bravely protected them, and killed upon the spot with his own hand two of the most forward of the assailants: cowed by the old man's intrepidity, and the preparations of their escort to defend themselves, the wretches slunk away, and so ended in blood and confusion the labours of the commissioners. To old Lincon they owed their lives, and subsequent safety on their road back to Buenos Ayres, whither they were glad to return as fast as they could, under an escort furnished by him and some of the more friendly tribes of the Huilliches.