CAPI. HORN. 



73 



sels, and have found them to agree, very generally, upon this 

 subject. The journals of voyagers, particularly of the earlier 

 navigators, give most fearful accounts of the tempests and dis- 

 asters, generally encountered in passing from the Atlantic to 

 the Pacific Ocean. And if shipwreck, in our time, be less fre- 

 quent than in the earlier ages, it must be attributed to the great 

 improvements in marine architecture, seamanship, and naviga- 

 tion, and not to any amelioration of the climate of the Cape, 

 and its vicinity. For we find, that a distinguished naval com- 

 mander, who visited the Pacific nearly twenty years since, 

 holds the following language : " The passage round Cape Horn, 

 from the eastward, I assert, from my own experience, is 

 the most dangerous, most difficult, and attended with more 

 hardships, than that of the same distance in any other part of 

 the world;"* 



Of the very many merchant vessels, annually doubling Cape 

 Horn, very few have been lost. The number that yearly pass 

 the Cape, may be estimated at three hundred, yet so far as I 

 have been able to learn, shipwrecks and total losses have not 

 averaged one a year. 



The principal difficulties of this navigation, arise from the 

 constant prevalence of the winds from the westward, with but 

 little variation. Vessels bound to the Pacific, have to contend 

 with these winds, which are accompanied with cold, cutting 

 rains, snow, hail, and sleet; and their crews are exhausted, 

 more by the continuance than by tJie severity of the weather. 

 Such was our own case, in the passage of 1831, and that of 

 several merchant vessels, with whose officers I have conversed. 



The usual route pursued, going from the Atlantic to the Pa- 

 cific Ocean, is to pass between the Falkland Islands and the 

 main, and draw round the land as much as the prevailing winds 

 will permit. Vessels always, if possible, "make the land" of 

 the Cape, that is, approach near enough to see it, and then hold 

 their way westward, until they reach the meridian of eighty 

 or eighty -five degrees of west longitude, before attempting to 



* Porter's Journal, vol. i. p. 82. See also, the Voyages of La Peroase, Lord 

 Anson, Basil Hall, Frezier, &c. 

 10 



