These poor neighbours had the freedom of the kitchen or
living-room; it was usually full of them, especially of the women,
gossiping, sipping endless mate, and listening with admiring attention
to the wise words which fell at intervals from the lips of the head of
the family or tribe.
Altogether, Don Anastacio in his ringlets was an ineffectual,
colourless, effeminate person, a perfect contrast to his ugly, barrel-
shaped, badly-dressed but robust-minded neighbour, Gandara. Yet he too
had a taste in animals which distinguished him among his fellow-
landowners, and even reminded one of Gandara in a ridiculous way. For
just as Gandara was devoted to piebald horses, so Don Anastacio was
devoted to pigs. It would not have been like him if these had been
pigs for profit: they were not animals fit to be fattened for the
market, and no person would have thought of buying such beasts. They
were of the wild-pig breed, descended originally from the European
animal introduced by the early Spanish colonists, but after two or
three centuries of feral life a good deal changed in appearance from
their progenitors. This feral pig was called _barraco_ in the
vernacular, and was about a third less in size than the domestic
animal, with longer legs and more pointed face, and of a uniform deep
rust-red in colour.
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