The personnel of the ranch often used to comment on the resemblance of certain youths laboring here the same as the others, galloping from the first streak of dawn over the fields, attending to the various duties of pasturing.  The overseer, Celedonio, a half-breed thirty years old, generally detested for his hard and avaricious character, also bore a distant resemblance to the patron.

Almost every year, some woman from a great distance, dirty and bad-faced, presented herself at the ranch, leading by the hand a little mongrel with eyes like live coals.  She would ask to speak with the proprietor alone, and upon being confronted with her, he usually recalled a trip made ten or twelve years before in order to buy a herd of cattle.

“You remember, Patron, that you passed the night on my ranch because the river had risen?”

The Patron did not remember anything about it.  But a vague instinct warned him that the woman was probably telling the truth.  “Well, what of it?”

“Patron, here he is. . . .  It is better for him to grow to manhood by your side than in any other place.”

And she presented him with the little hybrid.  One more, and offered with such simplicity! . . .  “Lack of religion and good habits!” Then with sudden modesty, he doubted the woman’s veracity.  Why must it necessarily be his? . . .  But his wavering was generally short-lived.

“If it’s mine, put it with the others.”

The mother went away tranquilly, seeing the youngster’s future assured, because this man so lavish in violence was equally so in generosity.  In time there would be a bit of land and a good flock of sheep for the urchin.

These adoptions at first aroused in Misia Petrona a little rebellion—­the only ones of her life; but the centaur soon reduced her to terrified silence.

“And you dare to complain of me, you weak cow! . . .  A woman who has only given me daughters.  You ought to be ashamed of yourself.”

The same hand that negligently extracted from his pocket a wad of bills rolled into a ball, giving them away capriciously without knowing just how much, also wore a lash hanging from the wrist.  It was supposed to be for his horse, but it was used with equal facility when any of his peons incurred his wrath.

“I strike because I can,” he would say to pacify himself.

One day, the man receiving the blow, took a step backward, hunting for the knife in his belt.

“You are not going to beat me, Patron.  I was not born in these parts. . . .  I come from Corrientes.”

The Patron remained with upraised thong.  “Is it true that you were not born here? . . .  Then you are right; I cannot beat you.  Here are five dollars for you.”

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.