3l6 TIERRA DEL FUEGO chap. 



sea ; and as we passed by, they sprang up and waving their 

 tattered cloaks sent forth a loud and sonorous shout. The 

 savages followed the ship, and just before dark we saw their fire, 

 and again heard their wild cry. The harbour consists of ^ fine 

 piece of water half surrounded by low rounded mountains of 

 clay -slate, which are covered to the water's edge by one dense 

 gloomy forest. A single glance at the landscape was sufficient 

 to show me how widely different it was from anything I had 

 ever beheld. At night it blew a gale of wind, and heavy squalls 

 from the mountains swept past us. It would have been a bad 

 time out at sea, and we, as well as others, may call this Good 

 Success Bay. 



In the morning the Captain sent a party to communicate with 

 the Fuegians. When we came within hail, one of the four 

 natives who were present advanced to receive us, and began to 

 shout most vehemently, wishing to direct us where to land. 

 When we were on shore the party looked rather alarmed, but 

 continued talking and making gestures with great rapidity. It 

 was without exception the most curious and interesting spectacle 

 I ever beheld : I could not have believed how wide was the dif- 

 ference between savage and civilised man : it is greater than 

 between a wild and domesticated animal, inasmuch as in man 

 there is a greater power of improvement. The chief spokesman 

 was old, and appeared to be the head of the family ; the three 

 others were powerful young men, about six feet high. The 

 women and children had been sent away. These Fuegians are a 

 very different race from the stunted, miserable wretches farther 

 westward ; and they seem closely allied to the famous Patago- 

 nians of the Strait of Magellan. Their only garment consists of 

 a mantle made of guanaco skin, with the wool outside ; this they 

 wear just thrown over their shoulders, leaving their persons as 

 often exposed as covered. Their skin is of a dirty coppery red 

 colour. 



The old man had a fillet of white feathers tied round his head, 

 which partly confined his black, coarse, and entangled hair. 

 His face was crossed by two broad transverse bars ; one, painted 

 bright red, reached from ear to ear and included the upper lip ; 

 the other, white like chalk, extended above and parallel to the 

 first, so that even his eyelids were thus coloured. The other 

 two men were ornamented by streaks of black powder, made of 



