252 TIERRA DEL FUEGO. [chap. xi. 



at Cape Gregory with the famous so-called gigantic Patagonians, 

 who gave us a cordial reception. Their height appears greater 

 than it really is, from their large guanaco mantles, their long 

 flowing hair, and general figure : on an average their height is 

 about six feet, with some men taller and only a few shorter ; 

 and the women are also tall ; altogether they are certainly the 

 tallest race which we anywhere saw. In features they strikingly 

 resemble the more northern Indians whom I saw with Rosas, 

 but they have a wilder and more formidable appearance : their 

 faces were much painted with red and black, and one man was 

 ringed and dotted with white like a Fuegian. Capt. Fitz Roy 

 offered to take any three of them on board, and all seemed de- 

 termined to be of the three. It was long before we could clear 

 the boat ; at last we got on board with our three giants, who 

 dined with the Captain, and behaved quite like gentlemen, help- 

 ing themselves with knives, forks, and spoons : nothing was so 

 much relished as sugar. This tribe has had so much commu- 

 nication with sealers and whalers, that most of the men can speak 

 a little English and Spanish ; and they are half civilised, and 

 proportionally demoralised. 



The next morning a large party went on shore, to barter for 

 skins and ostrich-feathers ; fire-arms being refused, tobacco was 

 in greatest request, far more so than axes or tools. The whole 

 population of the toldos, men, women, and children, were arranged 

 on a bank. It was an amusing scene, and it was impossible not to 

 like the so-called giants, they were so thoroughly good-humoured 

 and unsuspecting : they asked us to come again. They seem to 

 like to have Europeans to live with them ; and old Maria, an im- 

 portant woman in the tribe, once begged Mr. Low to leave any one 

 of his sailors with them. They spend the greater part of the year 

 here ; but in summer they hunt along the foot of the Cordillera : 

 sometimes they travel as far as the Rio Negro, 750 miles to the 

 north. They are well stocked with horses, each man having, ac- 

 cording to Mr. Low, six or seven, and all the women, and even 

 children, their one own horse. In the time of Sarmiento (1580), 

 these Indians had bows and arrows, now long since disused ; they 

 then also possessed some horses. This is a very curious fact, show- 

 ing the extraordinarily rapid multiplication of horses in South 

 America. The horse was first landed at Buenos Avres in 1537. 



