370 



NATIVES — 



BIIID-CATCHING. 



Dec. imi 



advantage of their weak state to beat the coxswain and take 

 away some of his clothes ; therefore after my return I went in 

 search of them. They had however taken the alarm, and were 

 all gone away. This party consisted of about twenty persons, 

 eight of whom were men, and the rest women and children. 

 When some of our officers went to their wigwams they appeared 

 armed with clubs, spears, and swords, which seemed to have 

 been made out of iron hoops, or else were old cutlasses worn 

 very thin by frequent cleaning. They must have obtained these, 

 and many trifles we noticed, from sealing vessels. By the visits 

 of those vessels, I suppose, they have been taught to hide their 

 furs and other skins, and have learned the effects of fire-arms. 

 The chief part of their subsistence on this island appeared to 

 be penguins, seal, young birds, and petrel whicli they take in 

 a curious way. Having caught a small bird they tie a string 

 to its leg and put it into a hole wliere blue petrels lay eggs^ 

 Several old birds instantly fasten upon the intruder, and are 

 drawn out with him by the string. 



" We weighed and worked out of the bay, increasing our 

 depth of water very gradually as we left the shore, but having 

 always the same bottom, fine speckled sand. I can safely recom- 

 mend this bay as a good anchorage for shipping, and two cablets 

 lengths N.N.W. of the Beagle^s berth as the best place. Wood 

 and water are not to be found so close to the anchorage as in 

 other Fuegian harbours, but they may be obtained with very 

 little trouble, and in any quantity, by going up the passage 

 (between the islands) to one of many streams which run from 

 the high land. There is plenty of water also very near the 

 best berth, on the south side, but frequently a surf breaks on 

 that beach. Two particular advantages which this roadstead 

 possesses, consist in the ease with which a vessel can enter or 

 leave it, during any wind ; and in its situation being well 

 pointed out by a remarkable headland, named Cape Inman (in 

 compliment to the Professor), which is high, with perpendicular 

 cliffs, and almost detached from other land ; so that a vessel, 



* A small vessel may moor Letween the islands, instead of lying- in the 

 outer road. 



