68 NATURAL HISTORY OF 



Patagonian side, the land assumed a much more elevated 

 character, and was densely covered with wood — a few bare 

 intervals, of limited extent only, here and there intervening. 

 The line of demarcation is singularly striking, and, as we 

 afterwards found, a change in the climate is initiated along 

 with the change in the vegetation, the clear bright weather of 

 the north-eastern part of the Strait being gradually succeeded, 

 as the country becomes more and more mountainous and 

 more thickly covered with trees, by an increase in the rain- 

 fall (which in the east is exceedingly small), till, in the 

 western portion of the Strait and on the west coast of Pata- 

 gonia, rain, as a rule, descends in torrents every day, and the 

 whole country is wringing wet. 



Between two and three o'clock we reached Punta Arenas, 

 or Sandy Point, the site of a small settlement established by 

 the Chilian government, and anchored in the roadstead — the 

 intendente or governor, Don Damian Eiobo, coming off soon 

 after to pay his respects, and, in conformity with instructions 

 from his government, to render offers of assistance to Captain 

 Mayne in carrying out the survey. The settlement, the only 

 one in the Strait with the exception of a small outpost at 

 Freshwater Bay, about twenty miles to the south-westward, 

 was, at the time of our arrival, almost entirely a penal one, 

 the population, with the exception of a few artizans, including a 

 Eussian and a Yankee blacksmith, etc., consisting of ChiKan 

 convicts, transported for a variety of offences, and maintained 

 under military discipline ; a detachment of about fifty sol- 

 diers, under a captain and lieutenant, being stationed here to 

 preserve order. About a year later, however, the number of 

 the inhabitants was considerably increased by the arrival of 

 about five hundred emigrants from Chiloe, who were sub- 

 sidised by the Chilian government until able to maintain 



