222 CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES [Proc 4th Ser. 



away as many as seven hundred, and that the ship's company 

 of a frigate some years since brought down in one day two 

 hundred tortoises to the beach. 



"October 8th. — We arrived at James Island: this island, as 

 well as Charles Island, were long since thus named after the 

 kings of the Stuart line. Mr. Bynoe, myself, and our servants 

 were left here for a week, with provisions and a tent, while the 

 'Beagle' went for water. We found here a party of Spaniards, 

 who had been sent from Charles Island to dry fish and to salt 

 tortoise-meat. About six miles inland, and at the height of 

 nearly 2,000 feet a hovel had been built in which two men lived, 

 who were employed in catching tortoises, while the others 

 were fishing on the coast. I paid this party two visits, and 

 slept there one night. As in the other islands, the lower 

 region was covered by nearly leafless bushes, but the trees were 

 here of a larger growth than elsewhere, several being two feet 

 and some even two feet nine inches in diameter. The upper 

 region being kept damp by the clouds supports a green and 

 flourishing vegetation. So damp was the ground that there 

 were large beds of coarse Cyperus, in which great numbers of 

 a very small water-rail lived and bred. While staying in this 

 upper region we lived entirely upon tortoise-meat: the breast- 

 plate roasted (as the Gauchos do came con cucro), with the 

 flesh on it, is very good ; and the young tortoises make excellent 

 soup ; but otherwise the meat to my taste is indifferent. * * * 



"Of sea-turtle I believe there is more than one species ; and 

 of tortoises there are, as we shall presently show, two or three 

 species or races. 



"I have not as yet noticed by far the most remarkable 

 feature in the natural history of this archipelago ; it is, that 

 the different islands to a considerable extent are inhabited by a 

 different set of beings. My attention was first called to this 

 fact by the Vice-Governor, Mr. Lawson, declaring that the 

 tortoises differed from the different islands, and that he could 

 with certainty tell from which island any one was brought. I 

 did not for some time pay sufficient attention to this state- 

 ment, and I had already partially mingled together the col- 

 lection from two of these islands. I never dreamed that 

 islands, about fifty or sixty miles apart, and most of them in 

 sight of each other, formed of precisely the same rocks, placed 



