1835.] EL BRAMADOR. 361 
ing-point, but the effect on their bodies, ill protected by clothing, 
must have been in proportion to the rapidity of the current of cold 
air. The gale lasted for more than a day; the men began to lose 
their strength, and the mules would not move onwards. My 
guide’s brother tried to return, but he perished, and his body was 
found two years afterwards, lying by the side of his mule near 
the road, with the bridle still in his hand. ‘Two other men in 
the party lost their fingers and toes; and out of two hundred 
mules and thirty cows, only fourteen mules escaped alive. Many 
years ago the whole of a large party are supposed to have perished 
from a similar cause, but their bodies to this day have never been 
discovered. The union of a cloudless sky, low temperature, and 
a furious gale of wind, must bé, I should think, in all parts of 
the world, an unusual occurrence. 
June 29th.—We gladly travelled down the valley to our for- 
mer night’s lodging, and thence to near the Agua amarga. On 
July lst we reached the valley of Copiapé. The smell of the 
fresh clover was quite delightful, after the scentless air of the 
dry sterile Despoblado. Whilst staying in the town I heard an 
account from several of the inhabitants, of a hill in the neigh- 
bourhood which they called ‘“ El Bramador,”—the roarer or 
bellower. I did not at the time pay sufficient attention to the 
account; but, as far as I understood, the hill was covered by 
sand, and the noise was produced only when people, by ascending 
it, put the.sand in motion. The same circumstances are described 
in detail on the authority of Seetzen and Ehrenberg,* as the 
cause of the sounds which have been heard by many travellers on 
Mount Sinai near the Red Sea. One person with whom I con- 
versed, had himself heard the noise; he described it as very sur- 
prising; and he distinctly stated that, although he could not 
understand how it was caused, yet it was necessary to set the sand 
rolling down the acclivity. A horse walking over dry and coarse 
sand, causes a peculiar chirping noise from the friction of the 
particles ; a circumstance which I several times noticed on the 
coast of Brazil. 
Three days afterwards I heard of the Beagle’s arrival at the 
* Edinburgh Phil, Journ., Jan. 1830, p. 74; and April, 1830, p. 258,— 
Also Daubeny on Volcanoes, p. 438; and Bengal Journ., vol. vii. p. 324. 
