SARMIENITO—MODERN SURVEYS. 565 
Strait of Magalhaens) to the island of Childe, may be said to 
have been wholly unknown ; for since the time of Sarmiento de 
Gamboa nothing in the least descriptive of it had been pub- 
lished, with the exception of the brief notices of two missionary 
voyages in piraguas, from Childe to the Guiateca and Guaianeco 
islands. 
Every person conversant with South American geography, must 
be acquainted with the voyage of Sarmiento. From the deter- 
mined perseverance shown by that excellent and skilful navigator, 
through difficulties of no ordinary nature, we are possessed of 
the details of a voyage down the western coast, and through the 
Strait of Magalhaens, that has never been surpassed. His journal 
has furnished us with the description of a coast more difficult and 
dangerous to explore than any which could readily be selected-—for 
it was at that time perfectly unknown, and is exposed to a climate 
of perpetual storms and rain: yet the account is written with such 
minute care and correctness, that we have been enabled to detect 
upon our charts almost every place described in the Gulf of 
Trinidad, and the channels to the south of it, particularly their 
termination at his Ancon sin Salida. 
It would be irrelevant to enter here into the history of Sar- 
miento’s voyage, or indeed of any other connected with these 
coasts. Modern surveys are made so much more in detail than 
those of former years, that little use can be made of the charts 
and plans that have been hitherto formed ; but the accounts of the 
voyages connected with them are replete with interesting and 
useful matter, and much amusement as well as information may be 
derived from their perusal, particularly Sir John Narborough’s 
journal, and Byron’s romantic and pathetic narrative of the loss of 
the Wager. 
The Cordillera of the Andes, which is known to extend from 
the northern part of the continent almost to its southern extremity, 
decreases in elevation near the higher southern latitudes. In the 
neighbourhood of Quito, Chimborazo and Pinchincha rear their 
summits to the height of nearly twenty-two thousand feet above 
the level of the sea; near Santiago de Chile the highest land is 
supposed to be fourteen thousand feet ; farther south, near Con- 
cepcion, it is lower ; and near Childe there are few parts of the 
range exceeding seven thousand feet. Between Childe and the 
