APPROACH TO GALLEGOS. 25 



from the water, while occasionally one would be seen to elevate his large 

 forked tail and several yards of the posterior portion of the body high in 

 the air, then, plunging suddenly and apparently almost vertically down- 

 ward, immediately disappear beneath the surface. They seemed to take 

 no alarm at our presence among them, appearing rather to enjoy our 

 company, for I noticed that for some moments several of them took a 

 position just forvvard of the vessel's bow, where they disported them- 

 selves in much the same manner as I have on other occasions observed 

 porpoises to do, crossing and re-crossing the vessel's course with the 

 greatest ease, while at the same time maintaining the same fonvard motion 

 as the ship. I had not supposed that these whales could swim so rapidly. 

 The excitement and amusement caused by their presence was soon termi- 

 nated, for they shortly disappeared almost as suddenly and quite as 

 mysteriously as they had appeared. 



After this pleasant distraction, all too quickly passed, we had time to 

 look about us and discern if possible the entrance to the Port of Gal- 

 legos. Far away in the distance could be seen a distinct, but perfectly 

 straight and unbroken line resting against the western horizon. To our 

 inexperienced eyes it was not possible to say definitely if it were land, for 

 what must be the nature of a country presenting such an apparently con- 

 tinuous and unbroken shore line as this? As we approached more nearly 

 the mouth of the river, our conjecture was verified, and as Cape Fair- 

 weather came in view on the northern shore, a rugged line of perpen- 

 dicular cliffs, four hundred to five hundred feet in height, was seen to 

 extend to the northward as far as the eye could reach. The flat, level 

 plain above terminates abruptly in the escarpment forming this sea wall. 

 The perfectly level surface of this plain is absolutely unrelieved by an 

 elevation, even of a few feet. 



Turning to the southern shore, to which we had now approached quite 

 near, it was seen to consist of a low, level plain, only slightly raised above 

 the water's level. In the foreground was a broad, shingle-covered beach 

 on which with the aid of our field glasses we could distinguish a small 

 band of guanaco, the first of these animals we had seen. A few miles 

 distant in the interior were a number of black, rugged piles of basalt and 

 other volcanic materials, remnants of volcanoes from which in no very 

 remote times, geologically speaking, the streams of lava now covering the 

 plains at their bases poured forth. These extinct volcanoes, known as the 



