Having taken an ample breakfast, we determined to push on to the tambo, where we must rest until the following morning. It was most important to reach it before dark, for should we be benighted our position would become critical in the extreme. Nerving ourselves for the undertaking, we marched forward. Providentially there was but little wind. As we advanced we saw the skeletons and carcasses of numerous mules; some perfectly blanched by the wind, others still partly covered with flesh, on which numberless galenachas, or black vultures, were busily feasting. The stench proceeding from others not long dead, close to which we had to pass, was most offensive. "At all events, no human beings appear to have died here," I observed to our guide. "Don't say that, until you have got further," he answered. In a few minutes we came in sight of a grinning skull placed on the top of a rock, the body lying below it. A few steps further on we came upon the skeletons of several persons lying with their legs across their mules; both the animal and its rider having evidently succumbed at the same moment. "This does not look pleasant," observed Uncle Richard; "but we must not allow it to depress our spirits." In spite, however, of the severe exertions we were making, we felt the cold every instant becoming greater. Antonio, though apparently as strong as any of us, became so benumbed that he could scarcely walk. He had brought a small flask of aguardiente, which he confessed he had drained to the bottom, but it had apparently had a bad effect on him. At length his sufferings became so great that we began to fear we must leave him behind, as to carry him on to the tambo would be impossible; though, if left behind, he would certainly die in a few minutes. While he was in this state, Padillo volunteered to go forward, recollecting that there was a spring in the neighbourhood, and urging us to try and reach it. In a short time Padillo returned with the information that the spring was only a little way on; so, while Uncle Richard took one of Antonio's arms, I took the other, and Padillo, with a stick, kept beating him severely about the body. Whenever Antonio cried out, Padillo answered, "Never mind, friend, never mind; it's all for your good." At length, what with pinching his arms, and Padillo's flagellation, he was kept alive until we reached the spring. Here we compelled him to drink a draught of water, though at first he showed a great unwillingness to swallow it, like a person afflicted with hydrophobia. In a wonderfully short time, however, he perfectly recovered, and declared that he felt warm and comfortable.