420 



THE POLAR WORLD. 



clean. Though these birds, which well supply the place of our carrion-crows, 

 magpies, and ravens, generally feed in common, they are by no means on a 

 friendly footing. When the carrancha is quietly seated on the branch of 

 a tree or on the ground, the chimango often continues for a long time flying 

 backward and forward, up and down, in a semicircle, trying each time, at the 

 bottom of the curve, to strike its larger relative, which takes little notice ex- 

 cept by bobbing its head. The carrancha, which is common in the dry and 

 open countries, and likewise on the arid shores of the Pacific, is also found in- 

 habiting the forests of West Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego. The chimango 

 is much smaller than the carrancha. Of all the carrion feeders, it is generally 

 the last which leaves the skeleton of a dead animal, and may frequently be seen 

 within the ribs of a horse, like a prisoner behind a grating. It is frequently 

 found on the sea-coast, where it lives on small fishes. 



The condor may likewise be reckoned among the Patagonian birds, as it 

 follows its prey, the guanaco, across the Strait of Magellan as far as the eastern 

 lowlands of Tierra del Fuego. In the winter especially, when the cold forces 

 vast numbers of geese and ducks to quit the Antarctic islands in the higher 

 latitudes, all these birds of prey, to which the crowned falcon ( Circcetes eo- 

 ronal2is), the three-colored buzzard {^Buteo tricolor), the Aguia eagle) Ha- 

 lioBtus aguia), and several others must be added, live in luxury. Most of them 

 are likewise migratory birds, and disappear in summer, with the defenseless 

 tribes on which they prey. The Magellanic thrush {Turdus magella^iicus) 

 leaves in winter the stormy banks of the strait, and retires to the milder skies 

 of the Rio Negro, where it meets the tuneful Patagonian warbler {Orpheus 

 patagonicus), the nimble troglodyte {Troglodytes pallida), and the inconstant 

 fly-catcher {Muscicape parvulus). 



A peculiar species of ostrich, the nandu {Bhea Darioini), roams over the 

 plains of Southern Patagonia as far as the Strait of Magellan. It is smaller than 

 the South American ostrich {Rhea americana), which inhabits the country of 

 La Plata as far as a little south of the Rio Negro ; but it is more beautiful, 

 as its white feathers are tipped with black at the extremity, and its black ones 

 in like manner terminate in white. 



In the same high latitude one is surprised to meet with a member of the 

 parrot tribe {Psittacus patagonicus) feeding on the seeds of the winter's bark, 

 and to see humming-birds {Trochilus forjicatus) flitting about during the snow- 

 storms in the forests of Tierra del Fuego. 



The plains of Patagonia are inhabited by a race of Indians supposed to be 

 gigantic, but the descriptions of modern travellers have dispelled the idea. 

 Thus Pigafetti, the companion of Magellan, relates that the Europeans only 

 reach to the waist of the Patagonians ; Simon de Weert tells us that they are 

 from ten to eleven feet high ; Byron, who visited them in the last century, 

 reduces them to seven feet, and Captain Knig finally, who accurately measured 

 them, found the medium height of the males about five feet eleven inches. As 

 the Patagonians have most likely not degenerated within the last few centuries, 

 we may infer from these various accounts that the travellers of the present day 

 are less prone to exaggeration than those of more ancient times. So much is 



