3i6 CHILOE CHAP. 



for the phenomenon, as described to us at San Carlos, was quite 

 a prodigy. 



The road to Cucao was so very bad that we determined to 

 embark in a periagua. The commandant, in the most authori- 

 tative manner, ordered six Indians to get ready to pull us 

 over, without deigning to tell them whether they would be 

 paid. The periagua is a strange rough boat, but the crew 

 were still stranger : I doubt if six uglier little men ever got 

 into a boat together. They pulled, however, very well and 

 cheerfully. The stroke-oarsman gabbled Indian, and uttered 

 strange cries, much after the fashion of a pig-driver driving his 

 pigs. We started with a light breeze against us, but yet 

 reached the Capella de Cucao before it was late. The country 

 on each side of the lake was one unbroken forest. In the same 

 periagua with us a cow was embarked. To get so large an 

 animal into a small boat appears at first a difficulty, but the 

 Indians managed it in a minute. They brought the cow along- 

 side the boat, which was heeled towards her ; then placing two 

 oars under her belly, with their ends resting on the gunwale, 

 by the aid of these levers they fairly tumbled the poor beast, 

 heels over head, into the bottom of the boat, and then lashed 

 her down with ropes. At Cucao we found an uninhabited 

 hovel (which is the residence of the padre when he pays this 

 Capella a visit), where, lighting a fire, we cooked our supper, 

 and were very comfortable. 



The district of Cucao is the only inhabited part on the whole 

 west coast of Chiloe. It contains about thirty or forty Indian 

 families, who are scattered along four or five miles of the shore. 

 They are very much secluded from the rest of Chiloe, and have 

 scarcely any sort of commerce, except sometimes in a little oil, 

 which they get from seal-blubber. They are tolerably dressed 

 in clothes of their own manufacture, and they have plenty to eat. 

 They seemed, however, discontented, yet humble to a degree 

 which it was quite painful to witness. These feelings are, I 

 think, chiefly to be attributed to the harsh and authoritative 

 manner in which they are treated by their rulers. Our com- 

 panions, although so very civil to us, behaved to the poor 

 Indians as if they had been slaves, rather than free men. They 

 ordered provisions and the use of their horses, without ever con- 

 descending to say how much, or indeed whether the owners should 



