_vaqueano_, he is a personage well convinced of his own importance; grave,
reserved, taciturn, whose word is law. Such a one was the famous Calébar,
the dreaded thief-taker of the Pampas, the Vidocq of Buenos Ayres. This
man during more than forty years exercised his profession in the Republic,
and a few years since was living, at an advanced age, not far from Buenos
Ayres. There appeared to be concentrated in him the acuteness and keen
perceptions of all the brethren of his craft; it was impossible to deceive
him; no one whose trail he had once beheld could hope to escape discovery.
An adventurous vagabond once entered his house, during his temporary
absence on a journey to Buenos Ayres, and purloined his best saddle. When
the robbery was discovered, his wife covered the robber's trail with a
kneading-trough. Two months later Calébar returned, and was shown the
almost obliterated footprint. Months rolled by; the saddle was apparently
forgotten; but a year and a half later, as the _rastreador_ was again at
Buenos Ayres, a footprint in the street attracted his notice. He followed
the trail; passed from street to street and from _plaza_ to _plaza_, and
finally entering a house in the suburbs, laid his hand upon the begrimed
and worn-out saddle which had once been his own _montura de fiesta_!

In 1830, a prisoner, awaiting the death-penalty, effected his escape from
jail. Calébar, with a detachment of soldiers, was put upon the scent.
Expecting this, and knowing that the gallows lay behind him, the fugitive
had adopted every expedient for baffling his pursuers: he had walked long
distances upon tiptoe; had scrambled along walls; had walked backwards,
crawled, doubled, leaped; but all in vain! Calébar's blood was up; his
reputation was at stake; to fail now would be an indelible disgrace. If
now and then he found himself at fault, he as often recovered the trail,
until the bank of a water-course was reached, to which the flying criminal
had taken. The trail was lost; the soldiers would have turned back; but
Calébar had no such thought. He patiently followed the course of the