Coquimbo Copper Trade — Shell Terraces. 83 



to the 1 6th of July, derives whatever importance it has got from 

 being one of the best (if not the very best) of the anchorages on 

 the Chilian coast, and from its connection with the copper trade. 

 It is brought into communication with the mines and smelting 

 works by means of a line of railway, which, independently of its 

 collateral branches, pierces the copper-producing country to a 

 distance of sixty miles. The copper, either in the form of ingots, 

 bars, or regulus, is shipped to Europe — principally to England — 

 in steamers or sailing vessels. The country, as far as the eye 

 can reach from the anchorage, is a mere sandy desert, dotted here 

 and there with an odd oasis of cultivated land, which has been 

 rendered productive by means of artificial irrigation. Trees are 

 rare ; but within the last few years the eucalyptus has been intro- 

 duced, and with great success. In properly irrigated localities 

 it thrives and grows with great rapidity, — in half-a-dozen years 

 rising to a height of sixty feet, — and forming masses of foliage, 

 which, by the shade it affords, increases the productiveness of 

 the neighbouring soil. 



Coquimbo has been rendered celebrated for its shell terraces 

 by the writings of Darwin, Basil Hall, and others. These are 

 long plateaux of variable size, sometimes a couple of hundred 

 yards, sometimes a mile in width, with their sharply- defined free 

 margins running more or less parallel to the curved outline of 

 the sea beach, and extending inland by a series of gradations, 

 like the tiers of boxes in a theatre. There are five or six of 

 these terraces; that furthest inland being about 250 feet above 

 the sea-level, and its free margin being about six miles from the 

 beach. They are of entirely marine origin, and abound in shells 

 of existing species, and they testify to the different periods of 

 elevation to which this part of the continent has been subjected. 



On the night of the 2nd of June we felt a slight shock of 

 earthquake. The cable rattled in the hawse-pipe as if it were 

 being violently shaken below by some giant who had got hold 

 of the other end ; and the ship vibrated and surged up and down 



