570 



WEST AND SOUTH PATAGONIA. 



Of the archipelago of Madre de Dios we know very little. It 

 has probably many deep openings on its seaward face, and is 

 fronted by islands and rocks. Its character is rocky and moun- 

 tainous, and by no means agreeable. The wide and safe channel 

 of Concepcion Strait separates it from the main land, which in this 

 part is much intersected by deep sounds, the principal of which, 

 the Canal of San Andres, extends to the base of the snowy range 

 of the Cordillera, and there Lieutenant Skyring describes it to be 

 suddenly closed by immense glaciers. 



Behind Hanover Island, which is separated from Madre de 

 Dios by the Concepcion Strait, the main-land is very much inter- 

 sected by sounds like the San Andres Channel, extending to the 

 base of the Andes. 



South of Hanover Island is Queen Adelaide Archipelago, through 

 which are several channels that communicate with the Strait of 

 Magalhaens; of which the principal, Smyth Channel, falls into 

 the Strait at Cape Tamar. 



In the winter of 1829, Captain Robert Fitz-Roy, then command- 

 ing the Beagle, in examining the Jerome Channel, which com- 

 municates with the Strait in that part called Crooked Reach, 

 discovered ' Otway Water,' an inland sea fifty miles long, trending 

 to the N.E., and separated from the eastern entrance of the Strait 

 by a narrow isthmus ; the actual width of which was not ascer- 

 tained, for in the attempt the boats were nearly lost. The south- 

 eastern shore is high and rocky, and generally precipitous, but the 

 northern is formed by low undulating grassy plains, free from 

 trees, and precisely like the country about the eastern entrance of 

 the Strait. At the north-west corner of the water a passage was 

 found leading in a north-west direction for twelve miles, when it 

 opened into another extent of water, about thirty-four miles long 

 and twenty wide. This he called the Skyring Water. Its southern 

 and western sides are bounded by mountainous land, but the 

 northern shore is low, apparently formed of undulating downs and 

 grassy plains, and in some places watered by rivulets. At the 

 western extremity of the water two openings were observed, 

 separated by a remarkable castellated mountain which was called 

 Dynevor Castle. Beyond the southernmost opening there was no 

 land visible, not even a distant mountain, which induced Captain 

 Fitz-Roy to suppose that it was a channel communicating with the 



