AUSTRAL-AMERICAN REGIONS. 



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broad conical mountains of moderate elevation. On their sides were 

 two or three small patches of snow ; while each mountain-summit for 

 some distance downwards in irregular streaks, was dull-white, as 

 though covered with Lichens. This appearance is attributed by King 

 to bare surfaces of "granite:" and the granitic character of the country 

 was soon demonstrated, by one mountain-summit being conspicuously 

 capped with a remnant of trap or basaltic rock. Lower down, the 

 mountains were freshly verdant to their base ; clothed, as well as could 

 be made out with the glass, with a luxuriant forest ; its slight filmy 

 or cobwebby aspect, being probably due to the whitish trunks and 

 branches of the "evergreen birch." Near at hand. Good-success Bay, 

 situated in " S. lat. 54° 48'," had been visited three weeks previously 

 by the Relief ; when on landing, Mr. Rich found the vegetable growth 

 " much more luxuriant than at Orange Harbor," farther South. 



On the 15th, we were at a greater distance from the land. The 

 weather cloudy with the sun out at intervals, as for some days past ; 

 but the temperature had become more chilly ; though on the whole, 

 the weather was regarded as "fine" for the Vicinity of Cape Horn. 



On the 16th, a pleasant summer day, with the temperature at 

 58° Fahr., the Vincennes doubled Cape Horn ; a pyramidal islet, "five 

 hundred feet high." Similar outlying islets are frequent along and 

 around the coast : which is iron-bound and steep, with the cliffs more 

 or less precipitous, and some of the detached rocks needle-shaped. 

 The coast-line is at the same time excessively indented ; narrow chan- 

 nels leading between islands, or in other instances expanding into 

 inland bays. 



There was no longer any whitish tinge on the mountain-summits, 

 but patches of snow were more frequent, with a general less inviting 

 aspect : in other respects, the character of the country continued 

 unchanged; as also further West; the succession of broad-conical 

 mountain peaks rising out of the sea to a very uniform elevation all 

 the way to Cape Glocester, and nowhere exceeding "twenty-six hun- 

 dred" feet in height. The view of Christmas Sound in Cook's Voy- 

 ages, gives a good idea of the outline of the whole South side of Terra 

 del Fuego. The forbidding blackened aspect of the mountain-flanks, 

 due to a kind of a black-colored wettish moss, if not the origin of the 

 name " terra del fuego" or " land of fire ;" has at least been mistaken ^ 

 for burnt districts by navigators. 



Just beyond Cape Horn, the Vincennes changed her course, and 



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