THE VOYAGE OF THE BEAGLE 



281 



they have very different temperature ; and this appears to be 

 the result of an unequal mixture of cold water: for those 

 with the lowest temperature have scarcely any mineral taste. 

 After the great earthquake of 1822 the springs ceased, and 

 the water did not return for nearly a year. They were also 

 much affected by the earthquake of 1835; the temperature 

 being suddenly changed from 118 0 to 92 0 . 1 It seems probable 

 that mineral waters rising deep from the bowels of the earth, 

 would always be more deranged by subterranean disturbances 

 than those nearer the surface. The man who had charge of 

 the baths assured me that in summer the water is hotter and 

 more plentiful than in winter. The former circumstance I 

 should have expected, from the less mixture, during the dry 

 season, of cold water ; but the latter statement appears very 

 strange and contradictory. The periodical increase during 

 the summer, when rain never falls, can, I think, only be 

 accounted for by the melting of the snow : yet the mountains 

 which are covered by snow during that season, are three or 

 four leagues distant from the springs. I have no reason to 

 doubt the accuracy of my informer, who, having lived on 

 the spot for several years, ought to be well acquainted with 

 the circumstance, — which, if true, certainly is very curious: 

 for we must suppose that the snow-water, being conducted 

 through porous strata to the regions of heat, is again thrown 

 up to the surface by the line of dislocated and injected rocks 

 at Cauquenes; and the regularity of the phenomenon would 

 seem to indicate that in this district heated rock occurred at 

 a depth not very great. 



One day I rode up the valley to the farthest inhabited 

 spot. Shortly above that point, the Cachapual divides into 

 two deep tremendous ravines, which penetrate directly into 

 the great range. I scrambled up a peaked mountain, prob- 

 ably more than six thousand feet high. Here, as indeed 

 everywhere else, scenes of the highest interest presented 

 themselves. It was by one of these ravines, that Pincheira 

 entered Chile and ravaged the neighbouring country. This 

 is the same man whose attack on an estancia at the Rio Negro 

 I have described. He was a renegade half-caste Spaniard, 

 who collected a great body of Indians together and estab- 



1 Caldcleugh, in Philosopb. Transact, for 1836. 



