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CHAPTER XXI.
WILD ADVENTURES ON PRAIRIE AND PAMPAS

If I were to describe even one half of the strange creatures we saw in the hermit's glen, the reader would be tired before I had finished, and even then I should not have succeeded in conveying anything like a correct impression of this floral wilderness and natural menagerie.

It puzzled me to know, and it puzzles me still, how so many wild creatures could have been got together in one place.

'I brought many of them here,' the hermit told us, 'but the others came, lured, no doubt, by the water, the trees, and the flowers.'

'But was the water here when you arrived?'

'Oh yes, else I would not have settled down here. The glen was a sort of oasis even then, and there were more bushes and trees than ever I had seen before in one place. The ducks and geese and swans, in fact, all the web-footed fraternity, had been here before me, and many birds and beasts besides – the biscachas, the armadilloes, the beetle-eating pichithiego, for instance – the great ant-eater, and the skunk – I have banished that, however – wolves, foxes, kites, owls, and condors. I also found peccaries, and some deer. These latter, and the guanaco, give me a wide berth now. They do not care for dogs, pumas, and jaguars. Insects are rather too numerous, and I have several species of snakes.'

Archie's —our Archie's – face fell.

'Are they?' he began, 'are they very – '

'Very beautiful? Yes; indeed, some are charming in colour. One, for example, is of the brightest crimson streaked with black.'

'I was not referring to their beauty; I meant were they dangerous?'

'Well, I never give them a chance to bite me, and I do not think they want to; but all snakes are to be avoided and left severely alone.'

'Or killed, sir?'

'Yes, perhaps, if killed outright; for the pampan Indians have an idea that if a rattlesnake be only wounded, he will come back for revenge. But let us change the subject. You see those splendid butterflies? Well, by and by the moths will be out; they are equally lovely, but when I first came here there were very few of either. They followed the flowers, and the humming-birds came next, and many other lovely gay-coloured little songsters. I introduced most of the parrots and toucans. There are two up there even now. They would come down if you were not here.'

'They are very funny-looking, but very pretty,' said Dugald. 'I could stop and look at them for hours.'

'But we must proceed. Here are the trees where the parrots mostly live. Early as it is, you see they are retiring.'

What a sight! What resplendency of colour and beauty! Such bright metallic green, lustrous orange, crimson and bronze!

'Why do they frequent this particular part of the wood?' said Dugald.

'Ah, boy,' replied the hermit, 'I see you want to know everything. Don't be ashamed of that; you are a true naturalist at heart. Well, the parrots like to be by themselves, and few of my birds care to live among them. You will notice, too, that yonder are some eucalyptus trees, and farther up some wide-spreading, open-branched trees, with flowers creeping and clinging around the stems. Parrots love those trees, because while there they have sunshine, and because birds of prey cannot easily tell which is parrot and which is flower or flame-coloured lichen.'

'That is an advantage.'

'Well, yes; but it is an advantage that also has a disadvantage, for our serpents are so lovely that even they are not easily seen by the parrots when they wriggle up among the orchids.'

'Can the parrots defend themselves against snakes?'

'Yes, they can, and sometimes even kill them. I have noticed this, but as a rule they prefer to scare them off by screaming. And they can scream, too. "As deaf as an adder," is a proverb; well, I believe it was the parrot that first deafened the adder, if deaf it be.'

'Have you many birds of prey?'

'Yes, too many. But, see here.'

'I see nothing.'

'No, but you soon shall. Here in the sunniest bank, and in this sunniest part of the wood, dwell a family of that remarkable creature the blind armadillo, or pichithiego. I wonder if any one is at home.'

As he spoke, the hermit knelt down and buried his hands in the sand, soon bringing to the surface a very curious little animal indeed, one of the tenderest of all armadilloes.

It shivered as it cuddled into the hermit's arms.

Dugald laughed aloud.

'Why,' he cried, 'it seems to end suddenly half-way down; and that droll tail looks stuck on for fun.'

'Yes, it is altogether a freak of Nature, and the wonder to me is how, being so tender, it lives here at all. You see how small and delicate a thing it is. They say it is blind, but you observe it is not; although the creatures live mostly underground. They also say that the chlamyphorus truncatus– which is the grand name for my wee friend, – carries its young under this pink or rosy shell jacket, but this I very much doubt. Now go to bed, little one.

'I have prettier pets than even these, two species of agoutis, for instance, very handsome little fellows indeed, and like rats in many of their ways and in many of their droll antics. They are not fond of strangers, but often come out to meet me in my walks about the woods. They live in burrows, but run about plentifully enough in the open air, although their enemies are very numerous. Even the Indians capture and eat them, as often raw as not.

'You have heard of the peccary. Well, I have never encouraged these wild wee pigs, and for some years after I came, there were none in the woods. One morning I found them, however, all over the place in herds. I never knew where they came from, nor how they found us out. But I do know that for more than two years I had to wage constant war with them.'

'They were good to eat?'

'They were tolerably good, especially the young, but I did not want for food; and, besides, they annoyed my wee burrowing pets, and, in fact, they deranged everything, and got themselves thoroughly hated wherever they went.'

'And how did you get rid of them?'

'They disappeared entirely one night as if by magic, and I have never seen nor heard one since. But here we are at my stable.'

'I see no stable,' I said.

'Well, it is an enclosure of half an acre, and my mules and goats are corralled here at night.'

'Do not the pumas or jaguars attempt to molest the mules or goats?'

'Strange to say, they do not, incredible as it may seem. But come in, and you will see a happy family.'

'What are these?' cried Dugald. 'Dogs?'

'No, boy, one is a wolf, the other two are foxes. All three were suckled by one of my dogs, and here they are. You see, they play with the goats, and are exceedingly fond of the mules. They positively prefer the company of the mules to mine, although when I come here with their foster-dam, the deerhound, they all condescend to leave this compound and to follow me through the woods.

'Here come my mules. Are they not beauties?'

We readily admitted they were, never having seen anything in size and shape to equal them.

'Now, you asked me about the jaguars. Mine are but few; they are also very civil; but I do believe that one of these mules would be a match even for a jaguar. If the jaguar had one kick he would never need another. The goats – here they come – herd close to the mules, and the foxes and wolf are sentinels, and give an alarm if even a strange monkey comes near the compound. Ah, here come my pet toucans!'

These strange-beaked birds came floating down from a tree to the number of nearly a dozen, nor did they look at all ungainly, albeit their beaks are so wondrously large.

'What do they eat?'

'Everything; but fruit is the favourite dish with them. But look up. Do you see that speck against the cloud yonder, no bigger in appearance than the lark that sings above the cornfields in England? See how it circles and sweeps round and round. Do you know that bird is a mile above us?'

'That is wonderful!'

'And what think you it is doing? Why, it is eyeing you and me. It is my pet condor. The only bird I do not feed; but the creature loves me well for all that. He is suspicious of your presence. Now watch, and I will bring him down like an arrow.'

The hermit waved a handkerchief in a strange way, and with one fell downward swoop, in a few seconds the monster eagle had alighted near us.

Well may the condor be called 'king of the air,' I thought, for never before had I seen so majestic a bird. He was near us now, and scrutinizing us with that bold fierce eye of his, as some chieftain in the brave days of old might have gazed upon spies that he was about to order away to execution. I believed then – and I am still of the same opinion – that there was something akin to pity and scorn in his steadfast looks, as if we had been brought here for his especial delectation and study.

'Poor wretched bipeds!' he seemed to say; 'not even possessed of feathers, no clothes of their own, obliged to wrap themselves in the hair and skins of dead quadrupeds. No beaks, no talons; not even the wings of a miserable bat. Never knew what it was to mount and soar into the blue sky to meet the morning sun; never floated free as the winds far away in the realms of space; never saw the world spread out beneath them like a living panorama, its woods and forests mere patches of green or purple, its lakes like sheets of shimmering ice, its streams like threads of spiders' webs before the day has drunk the dew, its very deserts dwarfed by distance till the guanacos and the ostriches¹⁵ look like mites, and herds of wild horses appear but crawling ants. Never knew what it was to circle round the loftiest summits of the snow-clad voiceless Andes, while down in the valleys beneath dark clouds rolled fiercely on, and lightnings played across the darkness; nor to perch cool and safe on peak or pinnacle, while below on earth's dull level the hurricane Pampero was levelling house and hut and tree; or the burning breath of the Zonda was sweeping over the land, scorching every flower and leaf, drinking every drop of dew, draining even the blood of moving beings till eyes ache and brains reel, till man himself looks haggard, wild, and worn, and the beasts of the forest, hidden in darkling caves, go mad and rend their young.'

The hermit returned with us to our camping-ground just as great bats began to circle and wheel around, as butterflies were folding their wings and going to sleep beneath the leaves, and the whole woodland glen began to awake to the screaming of night-birds, to the mournful howling of strange monkeys, and hoarse growl of beasts of prey.

We sat together till far into the night listening to story after story of the wild adventures of our new but nameless hero, and till the moon – so high above us now that the pine-trees no longer cast their shadows across the glade – warned us it was time to retire.

'Good night, boys all,' said the hermit; 'I will come again to-morrow.'

He turned and walked away, his potro boots making no sound on the sward. We watched him till the gloom of the forest seemed to swallow him up.

'What a strange being!' said Archie, with a sigh.

'And what a lonely life to lead!' said Donald.

'Ah!' said Dugald, 'you may sigh as you like, Archie, and say what you please, I think there is no life so jolly, and I've half a mind to turn hermit myself.'

We lived in the glen for many weeks. No better or more idyllic headquarters could possibly have been found or even imagined, while all around us was a hunter's paradise. We came at last to look upon the hermit's dell as our home, but we did not bivouac there every night. There were times when we wandered too far away in pursuit of the guanaco, the puma, jaguar, or even the ostrich, which we found feeding on plains at no great distance from our camp.

It was a glorious treat for all of us to find ourselves on these miniature pampas, across which we could gallop unfettered and free.

Under the tuition of Yambo, our capataz, and the other Gauchos, we became adepts in the use of both bolas and lasso. Away up among the beetling crags and in the deep, gloomy caverns we had to stalk the guanacos as the Swiss mountaineer stalks the chamois. Oh, our adventures among the rocks were sometimes thrilling enough! But here on the plains another kind of tactics was pursued. I doubt if we could have ridden near enough to the ostriches to bola them, so our plan was to make détours on the pampas until we had outflanked, encircled, and altogether puzzled our quarry. Then riding in a zigzag fashion, gradually we narrowed the ring till near enough to fire. When nearer still the battue and stampede commenced, and the scene was then wild and confusing in the extreme. The frightened whinny or neigh of the guanacos, the hoarse whirr of the flying ostriches, the shouts of the Gauchos, the bark and yell of dogs, the whistling noise of lasso or bolas, the sharp ringing of rifle and revolver – all combined to form a medley, a huntsman's chorus which no one who has once heard it and taken part in it is likely to forget.

When too far from the camp, then we hobbled our horses at the nearest spot where grass and water could be found, and after supping on broiled guanaco steak and ostrich's gizzard – in reality right dainty morsels – we would roll ourselves in our guanaco robes, and with saddles for pillows go quietly to sleep. Ah, I never sleep so soundly now as I used to then beneath the stars, fanned by the night breeze; and although the dews lay heavy on our robes in the morning, we awoke as fresh as the daisies and as happy as puma cubs that only wake to play.

We began to get wealthy ere long with a weight of skins of birds and beasts. Some of the most valuable of these were procured from a species of otter that lived in the blackest, deepest pools of a stream we had fallen in with in our wanderings. The Gauchos had a kind of superstitious dread of the huge beast, whom they not inappropriately termed the river tiger.

We had found our dogs of the greatest use in the hills, especially our monster bloodhound-mastiffs. These animals possessed nearly all the tracking qualities of the bloodhound, with more fierceness and speed than the mastiff, and nearly the same amount of strength. Their courage, too, and general hardiness were very great.

Among our spoils we could count the skins of no less than fifteen splendid pumas. Several of these had shown fight. Once, I remember, Archie had leapt from his horse and was making his way through a patch of bush on the plains, in pursuit of a young guanaco which he had wounded. He was all alone: not even a dog with him; but Yambo's quick ear had detected the growl of a lion in that bit of scrub, and he at once started off three of his best dogs to the scene of Archie's adventure. Not two hundred yards away myself, but on high ground, I could see everything, though powerless to aid. I could see Archie hurrying back through the bush. I could see the puma spring, and my poor cousin fall beneath the blow – then the death struggle began. It was fearful while it lasted, which was only the briefest possible time, for, even as I looked, the dogs were on the puma. The worrying, yelling, and gurgling sounds were terrible. I saw the puma on its hind legs, I saw one dog thrown high in the air, two others on the wild beast's neck, and next moment Yambo himself was there, with every other horseman save myself tearing along full tilt for the battle-field.

Yambo's long spear had done the work, and all the noise soon ceased. Though stunned and frightened, Archie was but little the worse. One dog was killed. It seemed to have been Yambo's favourite. I could not help expressing my astonishment at the exhibition of Yambo's grief. Here was a man, once one of the cruellest and most remorseless of desert wanderers, whose spear and knife had many a time and oft drunk human blood, shedding tears over the body of his poor dog! Nor would he leave the place until he had dug a grave, and, placing the bleeding remains therein, sadly and slowly covered them up.

But Yambo would meet his faithful hound again in the happy hunting-grounds somewhere beyond the sky. That, at least, was Yambo's creed, and who should dare deny him the comfort and joy the thought brings him!

It was now the sweetest season of all the year in the hills – the Indian summer. The fierce heat had fled to the north, fled beyond the salt plains of San Juan, beyond the wild desert lands of Rioja and arid sands of Catamarca, lingering still, perhaps, among the dreamland gardens of Tucuman, and reaching its eternal home among the sun-kissed forests of leafy Brazil and Bolivia. The autumn days were getting shorter, the sky was now more soft, the air more cool and balmy, while evening after evening the sun went down amidst a fiery magnificence of colouring that held us spellbound and silent to behold.

A month and more in the hermit's glen! We could hardly believe it. How quickly the time had flown! How quickly time always does fly when one is happy!

And now our tents are struck, our mules are laden. We have but to say good-bye to the solitary being who has made the garden in the wilderness his home, and go on our way.

'Good-bye!'

'Good-bye!'

Little words, but sometimes so hard to say.

We had actually begun to like – ay, even to love the hermit, and we had not found it out till now. But I noticed tears in Dugald's eye, and I am not quite sure my own were not moist as we said farewell.

We glanced back as we rode away to wave our hands once more. The hermit was leaning against a tree. Just then the sun came struggling out from under a cloud, the shadow beneath the tree darkened and darkened, till it swallowed him up.

And we never saw the hermit more.

CHAPTER XXII.
ADVENTURE WITH A TIGER

Two years more have passed away, four years in all, since we first set foot in the Silver West. What happy, blithesome years they had been, too! Every day had brought its duties, every duty its pleasures as well. During all this time we could not look back with regret to one unpleasant hour. Sometimes we had endured some crosses as well, but we brothers bore them, I believe, without a murmur, and Moncrieff without one complaining word.

'Boys,' he would say, quietly, 'nobody gets it all his own way in this world. We must just learn to take the thick wi' the thin.'

Moncrieff was somewhat of a proverbial philosopher; but had he been entrusted with the task of selecting proverbs that should smooth one's path in life, I feel sure they would have been good ones.

Strath Coila New, as we called the now green valley in which our little colony had been founded, had improved to a wonderful extent in so brief a time. The settlers had completed their houses long ago; they, like ourselves, had laid out their fields and farms and planted their vineyards; the hedges were green and flowering; the poplar-trees and willows had sprung skywards as if influenced by magic – the magic of a virgin soil; the fields were green with waving grain and succulent lucerne; the vines needed the help of man to aid them in supporting their wondrous wealth of grapes; fruit grew everywhere; birds sang everywhere, and to their music were added sounds even sweeter still to our ears – the lowing of herds of sleek fat cattle, the bleating armies of sheep, the home-like noise of poultry and satisfied grunting of lazy pigs. The latter sometimes fed on peaches that would have brought tears of joy to the eyes of many an English market gardener.

Our villa was complete now; wings and tower, and terraced lawns leading down to the lake, close beside which Dugald had erected a boat-house that was in itself like a little fairy palace. Dugald had always a turn for the romantic, and nothing would suit him by way of a boat except a gondola. What an amount of time and taste he had bestowed on it too! and how the Gaucho carpenters had worked and slaved to please him and make it complete! But there it was at last, a thing of beauty, in all conscience – prows and bows, cushioned seats, and oars, and awnings, all complete.

It was his greatest pleasure to take auntie, Aileen, and old Jenny out to skim the lake in this gondola, and sit for long happy hours reading or fishing.

Even Bombazo used to form an item in these pleasant little excursions. He certainly was no use with an oar, but it was the 'bravo' captain's delight to dress as a troubadour and sit twanging the light guitar under the awnings, while Aileen and auntie plied the oars.

Dugald was still our mighty hunter, the fearless Nimrod of hill and strath and glen. But he was amply supported in all his adventures by Archie, who had wonderfully changed for the better. He was brown and hard now, an excellent horseman, and crack shot with either the revolver or rifle.

Between the two of them, though ably assisted by a Gaucho or two, they had fitted up the ancient ruined monastery far away among the hills as a kind of shooting-box, and here they spent many a day, and many a night as well. Archie had long since become acclimatized to all kinds of creepies – they no longer possessed any terrors for him.

The ruin, as I have before hinted, must have, at some bygone period, belonged to the Jesuits; but so blown up with sand was it when Dugald took possession that the work of restoration to something like its pristine form had been a task of no little difficulty. The building stood on a slight eminence, and at one side grew a huge ombu-tree. It was under this that the only inhabitable room lay. This room had two windows, one on each side, facing each other, one looking east, the other west. Neither glass nor frames were in these windows, and probably had not existed even in the Jesuits' time. The room was cooler without any such civilized arrangements.

It was a lonesome, eerie place at the very best, and that weird looking ombu-tree, spreading its dark arms above the grey old walls, did not detract from the air of gloom that surrounded it. Sometimes Archie said laughingly that the tree was like a funeral pall. Well, the half-caste Indians of the estancias used to give this ruin a wide berth; they had nasty stories to tell about it, stories that had been handed down through generations. There were few indeed of even the Gauchos who would have cared to remain here after night-fall, much less sleep within its walls. But when Dugald's big lamp stood lighted on the table, when a fire of wood burned on the low hearth, and a plentiful repast, with bowls of steaming fragrant maté, stood before the young men, then the room looked far from uncomfortable.

There was at each side a hammock hung, which our two hunters slept in on nights when they had remained too long on the hill, or wanted to be early at the chase in the morning.

'Whose turn is it to light the fire to-night?' said Dugald, one winter evening, as the two jogged along together on their mules towards the ruin.

'I think it is mine, cousin. Anyhow, if you feel lazy I'll make it so.'

'No, I'm not lazy, but I want to take home a bird or two to-morrow that auntie's very soul loveth, so if you go on and get supper ready I shall go round the red dune and try to find them.'

'You won't be long?'

'I sha'n't be over an hour.'

Archie rode on, humming a tune to himself. Arrived at the ruin, he cast the mule loose, knowing he would not wander far away, and would find juicy nourishment among the more tender of the cacti sprouts.

Having lit a roaring fire, and seen it burn up, Archie spread asunder some of the ashes, and placed thereon a huge pie-dish – not an empty one – to warm. Meanwhile he hung a kettle of water on the hook above the fire, and, taking up a book, sat down by the window to read by the light of the setting sun until the water should boil.

A whole half-hour passed away. The kettle had rattled its lid, and Archie had hooked it up a few links, so that the water should not be wasted. It was very still and quiet up here to-night, and very lonesome too. The sun had just gone down, and all the western sky was aglow with clouds, whose ever-changing beauty it was a pleasure to watch. Archie was beginning to wish that Dugald would come, when he was startled at hearing a strange and piercing cry far down below him in the cactus jungle. It was a cry that made his flesh quiver and his very spine feel cold. It came from no human lips, and yet it was not even the scream of a terror-struck mule. Next minute the mystery was unravelled, and Dugald's favourite mule came galloping towards the ruin, pursued by an enormous tiger, as the jaguar is called here.

Just as he had reached the ruin the awful beast had made his spring. His talons drew blood, but the next moment he was rolling on the ground with one eye apparently knocked out, and the foam around his fang-filled mouth mixed with blood; and the mule was over the hills and safe, while the jaguar was venting his fume and fury on Archie's rugs, which, with his gun, he had left out there.

There is no occasion to deny that the young man was almost petrified with fear, but this did not last long: he must seek for safety somehow, somewhere. To leave the ruin seems certain death, to remain is impossible. Look, the tiger even already has scented him; he utters another fearful yell, and makes direct for the window. The tree! the tree! Something seems to utter those words in his ear as he springs from the open window. The jaguar has entered the room as Archie, with a strength he never knew he possessed, catches a lower limb and hoists himself up into the tree. He hears yell after yell; now first in the ruin, next at the tree foot, and then in the tree itself. Archie creeps higher and higher up, till the branches can no longer bear him, and after him creeps death in the most awful form imaginable. Already the brute is so close that he sees his glaring eye and hears his awful scenting and snuffling. Archie is fascinated by that tiger's face so near him – on the same limb of the tree, he himself far out towards the point. This must be fascination. He feels like one in a strange dream, for as the time goes by and the tiger springs not, he takes to speculating almost calmly on his fate, and wondering where the beast will seize him first, and if it will be very painful; if he will hear his own bones crash, and so faint and forget everything. What fangs the tiger has! How broad the head, and terribly fierce the grin! But how the blood trickles from the wound in the skull! He can hear it pattering on the dead leaves far beneath.

Why doesn't the tiger spring and have it over? Why does – but look, look, the brute has let go the branch and fallen down, down with a crash, and Archie hears the dull thud of the body on the ground.

Dead – to all intents and purposes. The good mule's hoof had cloven the skull.

'Archie! Archie! where on earth are you? Oh, Archie!'

It is Dugald's voice. The last words are almost a shriek.

Then away goes fear from Archie's heart, and joy unspeakable takes its place.

'Up here, Dugald,' he shouts, 'safe and sound.'

I leave the reader to guess whether Dugald was glad or not to see his cousin drop intact from the ombu-tree, or whether or not they enjoyed their pie and maté that evening after this terrible adventure.

'I wonder,' said Archie, later on, and just as they were preparing for hammock, 'I wonder, Dugald, if that tiger has a wife. I hope she won't come prowling round after her dead lord in the middle of the night.'

'Well, anyhow, Archie, we'll have our rifles ready, and Dash will give us ample warning, you know. So good-night.'

'Good-night. Don't be astonished if you hear me scream in my sleep. I feel sure I'll dream I'm up in that dark ombu-tree, and perhaps in the clutches of that fearsome tiger.'

About a month after the above related adventure the young men had another at that very ruin, which, if not quite so stirring, was at all events far more mysterious.

It happened soon after a wild storm, a kind of semi-pampero, had swept over the glen with much thunder and lightning and heavy rains. It had cleared the atmosphere, however, which previously had been hazy and close. It had cooled it as well, so that one afternoon, Dugald, addressing Archie, said,

'What do you say to an early morning among the birds to-morrow, cousin?'

'Oh, I'm ready, Dugald, if you are,' was the reply.

'Well, then, off you trot to the kitchen, and get food ready, and I'll see to the shooting tackle and the mules.'

When Dugald ran over to say good-night to Moncrieff and Aileen before they started, he met old Jenny in the door.

'Dear laddie,' she said, when she heard he was bound for the hills, 'I hope nae ill will come over ye; but I wot I had an unco' ugly dream last night. Put your trust in Providence, laddie. And ye winna forget to say your prayers, will ye?'

'That we won't, mother. Ta, ta!'

Moncrieff saw Dugald to his own gate. With them went Wolf, the largest bloodhound-mastiff.

'Dreams,' said Moncrieff, 'may be neither here nor there; but you'll be none the worse for taking Wolf.'

'Thank you,' said Dugald; 'he shall come, and welcome.'

The sun had quite set before they reached the ruin, but there was a beautiful after-glow in the west – a golden haze beneath, with a kind of crimson blush over it higher up. When they were on a level with the ruin, the two windows of which, as already stated, were opposite to each other, Archie said, musingly,

'Look, Dugald, what a strange and beautiful light is streaming through the windows!'

'Yes,' replied Dugald, 'but there is something solemn, even ghostly, about it. Don't you think so?'

'True; there always is something ghostly about an empty ruin, I think. Are you superstitious?'

'No; but – see. What was that? Why, there is some one there! Look to your rifle, Archie. It was an Indian, I am certain.'

What had they seen? Why, only the head and shoulders of a passing figure in the orange light of the two windows. It had appeared but one moment – next it was gone. Rifles in left hand, revolvers in right, they cautiously approached the ruin and entered. Never a soul was here. They went out again, and looked around; they even searched the ombu-tree, but all in vain.