432 FUEGIANS. 



The Fuegians. 



The inhabitants of Tierra del Fuego are even more de- 

 graded than those of the main land : in fact, they have been 

 regarded by many travellers as being the lowest of mankind.* 

 Adolph Decker, who visited Polynesia and Australasia under 

 Jaques le Hermite in 1624, describes them as "rather beasts 

 than men ; for they tear human bodies to pieces, and eat the 

 flesh, raw and bloody as it is. There is not the least spark 

 of religion or policy to be observed among them : on the 

 contrary, they are in every respect brutal" of which he 

 proceeds to give evidence so convincing, that I refrain 

 from quoting it.f " The men go altogether naked, and the 



women have only a bit of skin about their middles ; 



Their huts are made of trees, in the shape of tents, with a 

 hole at the top to let out the smoke. Within they are sunk 

 two or three feet under the earth ; and the mould is thrown 

 upon the outside. Their fishing-tackle is very curious, and 

 their stone hooks very nearly the same shape as ours. They 

 are differently armed, some having bows, and arrows headed 

 with stone ; others have long javelins, pointed with bone ; 

 some again have great wooden clubs ; and some have slings, 

 with stone-knives, which are very sharp." Their arrows are 

 of hard wood, straight and well polished. They are about 

 two feet long, and are tipped with a piece of agate, obsidian, 

 or glass ; the head not being fixed to the shaft, remains in 

 the wound, even when the arrow is drawn out. The bows 

 are from three to four feet long, and quite plain. The string 

 is made of twisted sinews. 



ForsterJ found them "remarkably stupid, being incapable 

 of understanding any of our signs, which, however, were 



* Byron's Voyage Round the "World, p. 80 ; "Wallis's Voyage Bound the 

 "World, p. 392; Cook's Voyage to the South Pole, vol. ii., p. 187; Darwin's 

 Journal, p. 235. f Calender's Voyages, vol. ii., p. 307. J lc. p. 251. 



