When Desnoyers came on the place, Madariaga was beginning to lose count
of those who were under his dominion in the old Latin sense, and could
take his blows. There were so many that confusion often reigned.

The Frenchman admired the Patron's expert eye for his business. It was
enough for him to contemplate for a few moments a herd of cattle, to
know its exact number. He would go galloping along with an indifferent
air, around an immense group of horned and stamping beasts, and
then would suddenly begin to separate the different animals. He had
discovered that they were sick. With a buyer like Madariaga, all the
tricks and sharp practice of the drovers came to naught.

His serenity before trouble was also admirable. A drought suddenly
strewed his plains with dead cattle, making the land seem like an
abandoned battlefield. Everywhere great black hulks. In the air, great
spirals of crows coming from leagues away. At other times, it was the
cold; an unexpected drop in the thermometer would cover the ground with
dead bodies. Ten thousand animals, fifteen thousand, perhaps more, all
perished!

"WHAT a knock-out!" Madariaga would exclaim with resignation. "Without
such troubles, this earth would be a paradise. . . . Now, the thing to
do is to save the skins!"

And he would rail against the false pride of the emigrants, against the
new customs among the poor which prevented his securing enough hands to
strip the victims quickly, so that thousands of hides had to be lost.
Their bones whitened the earth like heaps of snow. The peoncitos (little
peons) went around putting the skulls of cows with crumpled horns on