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Updated: May 4, 2025
The inanimate works of nature rock, ice, snow, wind, and water all warring with each other, yet combined against man here reigned in absolute sovereignty. June 9th. In the morning we were delighted by seeing the veil of mist gradually rise from Sarmiento, and display it to our view. This mountain, which is one of the highest in Tierra del Fuego, has an altitude of 6800 feet.
The German explorer Hassler has alleged the existence of a pigmy race in Brazil, but testimony is wanting to support such allegation. There are two tribes of very short but not pigmy stature in America, the Yahgans of Tierra del Fuégo and the Utes of Colorado, but both of these average over five feet.
From these several facts, and more especially from the case of the clay-slate in Tierra del Fuego, it must, I think, be concluded, that the same power which has impressed on the slate its fissile structure or cleavage has tended to modify its mineralogical character in parallel planes. Let us now turn to the foliation of the metamorphic schists, a subject which has been much less attended to.
I myself learned more seamanship, I think, on the Spray than on any other ship I ever sailed, and as for patience, the greatest of all the virtues, even while sailing through the reaches of the Strait of Magellan, between the bluff mainland and dismal Fuego, where through intricate sailing I was obliged to steer, I learned to sit by the wheel, content to make ten miles a day beating against the tide, and when a month at that was all lost, I could find some old tune to hum while I worked the route all over again, beating as before.
Captain Gancy is aware that the late Calypso's carpenter was for a long time a sealer, and in this capacity had spent more than one season in the sounds and channels of Tierra del Fuego. He knows also that the old sailor can be trusted, and so, without pressing for further explanation, he steers straight for the island.
But it was our misfortune to find that the Pacific Ocean was to us less hospitable than the turbulent neighbourhood of Tierra del Fuego and Cape Horn; for being arrived, on the 8th of May, off the island of Socoro, which was the first rendezvous appointed for the squadron, and where we hoped to have met with some of our companions, we cruised for them in that station several days.
Just, however, as we were entering them, a strong south westerly gale sprang up, which prevented us from making the attempt. We accordingly stood into a sheltered bay in Terra del Fuego. The shore looked very inhospitable dark rocks rose up at a little distance from the water and seemed to form a barrier between the sea and the interior.
The Run from New Zealand to Terra del Fuego, with the Range from Cape Deseada to Christmas Sound, and Description of that Part of the Coast. 1774 November
They are ten in number, of which St Jago, St Nicholas, Bonavista, St Antonio, Brava, Mayo, and Fuego are inhabited. St Jago is much the largest and best, and is the seat of the chief governor. Besides sugar and tobacco, this island produces a small quantity of indigo, which, with goat-skins and some other articles, are sent to Lisbon.
But to the great disappointment of everybody, that craft most persistently refused to put in an appearance; and when the next morning dawned the high, rocky cliffs of Tierra del Fuego and the Patagonian coast lay before them, and it became evident that the Peruvian had either retreated up the Straits, or that she was still behind them.
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