FOOD — DRINK WOMEN. 



185 



eat unless hard pressed by hunger. Sometimes they spear fine 

 fish, like cod-fish — fifteen or twenty pounds in weight. Small 

 fish are caught in abundance by the method formerly de- 

 scribed,* and they are the staple article of food among the 

 Tekeenica. The fins of a dead whale are esteemed ; but if 

 other food is to be had, they do not eat the blubber. 



In the Tekeenica country, near the Beagle Channel, there are 

 many small animals, about the size of a cat, which they some- 

 times take and eat. These, I think, are nutria ; for, on one 

 occasion, a fresh nutria skin was obtained from them, the only 

 sign I ever found of a small animal in that neighbourhood. 



Of vegetable food they have very little : a few berries, cran- 

 berries, and those which grow on the arbutus, and a kind of 

 fungus, which is found on the birch-tree, being the only sorts 

 used. This fungus is very plentiful in some places : it grows 

 upon the birch-tree much as the oak-apple upon an oak-tree. 

 Mr. Darwin describes it fully in his journal (vol. iii). There 

 is also another much larger kind of fungus, which is sometimes 

 eaten. On what tree it grows, I know not, but it was mentioned 

 to me as being about two feet in circumference. The Fuegians 

 drink only pure water, but often, and in large quantities. The 

 women or children fetch it in small buckets, made of birch- 

 bark ; and two or three times in the course of a night they 

 wake to eat and drink. In the day-time also they eat and 

 drink very frequently. 



The men procure food of the larger kind, such as seal, otter, 

 porpoises, &c. ; they break or cut wood and bark for fuel, as 

 well as for building the wigwams and canoes. They go out at 

 night to get birds; they train the dogs, and of course under- 

 take all hunting or warlike excursions. 



The women nurse their children, attend the fire (feeding it 

 with dead wood, rather than green, on account of the smoke), 

 make baskets and water-buckets, fishing-lines and necklaces,*!- 

 go out to catch small fish in their canoes, gather shell-fish, 

 dive for sea-eggs, take care of the canoes, upon ordinary occa- 

 sions paddle their masters about while they sit idle ; — and do 

 any other drudgery. 



* See vol. i. p. 428. f See note at end of chapter. 



