ovalle's iiistorical relation of chile. 



145 



there is a continual night, without any appearance of day, when the fun coming to the 

 tropick of Cancer, makes our fummer ; on the contrary, when he draws near the 

 tropick of Capricorn, there is continual day, without any Ihadow of night. 



And now lately, in the year forty-three, the Dutch having fent a fleet under the 



command of Anthony Brun, which pafled the ftraights with a defign to fettle at Val- 



divia, as they endeavoured ; they failed afterwards into feventy degrees, where they 



difcovered an ifland, which they called Barnevelt, in which they faw the footfleps of 



men of large ftature, and obferved great fmoaks : this place was fo cold, that the 



Dutch could not endure the rigour of the weather, which was nothing but froft and 



fnow,- it being then June or July, which is the depth of their winter, and a perpetual 



night, without feeing the fun one hour in a day. It is a wonder how thefe iflanders 



pafs their time in fo much cold and darknefs, without any thing to cover their naked- 



nefs ; for wanting commerce with Chile, or other parts in Europe, they have neither 



fheep nor goats, nor any thing that produces wool fit to make them garments. It 



muft be owned, that men are quite other creatures than the nice imagination of fome 



effeminate nations takes them to be ; and human nature, by cuftom, accommodates 



itfelf to the place where it is bred, fo that very often men will not leave that place for 



. any other more full of conveniency. It is for this that thefe Indians fhow fuch an aver- 



fion to leave their country where they were born and bred ; and though it be a mifer- 



able one, and thofe they go to more delicious, yet there is no fweetnels in any one like 



that of their own country. 



There is a report likewife, that in the ftraights of Magellan there are pigmies, 

 but I know not upon what it is founded ; for all the authors that relate the voyages 

 made into thofe parts, fpeak always of giants, or men of a gigantick form, who exceed 

 us in ftrength and ftature ; and it is faid in one of thefe relations, that the ftiip*s men, 

 in a certain place, beginning to fight with thefe Indians, they pulled up great trees by 

 the roots, to ufe them as a retrenchment, as we may fee in a picture in Theodore and 

 Jean de Bry ; but I cannot imagine how this report of pigmies was invented ; and it 

 feems to me a jeft or irony, or, perhaps, among thefe giants there are fome dwarfs. 



That which was feen by the vice-admiral of George Spilberg's fleet, was a body of 

 about two feet and a half high, which was buried with another of an ordinary ftature 

 in a grave of very little depth, and covered after the Indian way, with a pyramid of 

 ftones, in an ifland called the Great Ifland, about the fecond mouth of the ftraights ; 

 and from hence, perhaps, or from having feen fome of that littlenefs alive, this report 

 of pigmies took its rife. ^ 



This is all the account I can give of the inhabitants of the ftraights, and iflands 

 about it. Time will, perhaps, enable us to be more particular, when by commerce we 

 are better acquainted with them j and then, without doubt, there will not be wanting 

 authors to write about them. 



CHAP. VII. — Of the Indians of Cuyo, who are on the other Side of the Cordillera^ to 



the Eaji of Chile, 



THE Indians of the province of Cuyo, though in many things they are like the 

 inhabitants of Chile, yet in many others they are not fo. For firft, they are not fo 

 white, but more copper-coloured, which may be attributed to the great heat they en- 

 dure in fummer. Secondly, they are not fo cleanly, nor do not build fuch neat houfes 

 to live in : but their habitations are wretched ; nay fome, who live in the marflies, 



make 



