132 NATURAL HISTOEY OF 



and accordingly descended without loss of time, occupying 

 the remainder of the afternoon in a walk down the coast, to 

 ascertain the position of one of the boats which had been 

 appointed to work in concert with us. After struggling 

 along for some miles, with a stinging shower of fine sand 

 driving in our faces, we had the satisfaction of seeing the 

 boat in question lying in a sheltered locality, and accordingly 

 turned our faces homewards, finding on our return to camp the 

 men still engaged in laboriously struggling to pitch the tents, 

 a most difficult process, owing to the violence of the wind. 

 At length, however, this was successfully accomplished, and, 

 comfortably housed, we passed a pleasant evening in reading 

 and conversation. 



Next morning (29th) we rose about 4 o'clock, finding the 

 gale as violent as ever ; and after we had breakfasted, I 

 strolled about the neighbourhood, while Captain Mayne and 

 his assistant were at work with the theodolite. At one spot 

 I came within twenty yards of a guanaco, which remained 

 stock-still, gazing at me for a few minutes with apparent sur- 

 prise, and then made off. On the beach many large masses 

 of the curious social Ascidian I have mentioned a few pages 

 back were lying, together with numerous fragments of the 

 skeletons of birds, nine-tenths of which were those of cormo- 

 rants, readily identified even when the skull was absent, which 

 was generally the case, by the peculiar form of the breast-bone. 

 Early in the forenoon we set out on a walk of about eight miles 

 down the coast of the Narrows, a most fatiguing exploit, 

 owing to the high wind and the uneven nature of the ground, 

 which was everywhere raised into little hillocks by the tun- 

 nelling operations of a burrowing rat. These hillocks were in 

 general surmounted by tussocks of grass, and were placed so 

 close together that it was hardly possible to plant both one's 



