Charley and Hubert deserved Mr. Percy's commendation. They were now
sixteen and fifteen years old respectively, and were remarkably
strong, well-grown lads, looking at least a year older than they
really were. In a few minutes the luggage was packed in two bullock
carts, and they were on their way out to Mr. Percy's station, which
was about halfway to the camp of Mr. Hardy. The word camp in the
pampas means station or property; it is a corruption of the Spanish
word _campos_, literally plains or meadows.

Here they found that Mr. Percy had most satisfactorily performed
the commission with which Mr. Hardy had entrusted him. He had
bought a couple of the rough country bullock carts, three pair of
oxen accustomed to the yoke, half a dozen riding horses, two milch
cows, and a score of sheep and cattle to supply the larder. He had
hired four men--a stock-keeper named Lopez, who was called the
capitaz or head man, a tall, swarthy fellow, whose father was a
Spaniard, and his mother a native woman; two laborers, the one a
German, called Hans, who had been some time in the colony, the
other an Irishman, Terence Kelly, whose face the boys remembered at
once, as having come out in the same ship with themselves. The last
man was an American, one of those wandering fellows who are never
contented to remain anywhere, but are always pushing on, as if they
thought that the further they went the better they should fare. He
was engaged as carpenter and useful man, and there were few things
to which he could not turn his hand. Mr. Hardy was pleased with
their appearance; they were all powerful men, accustomed to work.
Their clothes were of the roughest and most miscellaneous kind, a
mixture of European and Indian garb, with the exception of Terence,
who still clung to the long blue-tailed coat and brass buttons of