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Title: The Gold Diggings of Cape Horn
       A Study of Life in Tierra del Fuego and Patagonia

Author: John R. Spears

Release Date: March 11, 2012 [EBook #39109]

Language: English

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[Illustration: MAP OF THE CAPE HORN REGION.]




THE GOLD DIGGINGS OF CAPE HORN

A STUDY OF LIFE IN TIERRA DEL FUEGO AND PATAGONIA

BY

JOHN R. SPEARS

ILLUSTRATED

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS

NEW YORK
27 WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET

LONDON
24 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND

The Knickerbocker Press

1895


COPYRIGHT, 1895

BY

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS

_Entered at Stationers' Hall, London_

The Knickerbocker Press, New Rochelle, N.Y.


TO ALL WHO LOVE THE RED ABORIGINES OF THE AMERICAS
AS GOD MADE THEM.




PREFACE


I am impelled to say, by way of preface, that the readers will find
herein such a collection of facts about the coasts of Tierra del Fuego
and Patagonia as an ordinary newspaper reporter might be expected to
gather while on the wing, and write when the journey was ended. It was
as a reporter of _The Sun_, of New York, that I visited the region
described. And instead of giving these facts in the geographical
sequence in which they were gathered, I have grouped them according to
the subjects to which they relate. So it happens that the work is what
may be properly called a collection of newspaper sketches rather than
the conventional story of a traveller. I make this explanation the more
freely for the reason that book-buyers as a rule, so book publishers
have repeatedly told me, do not take kindly to newspaper sketches bound
in book form. They resent as an attempted imposition, it is said, the
masking of such writings in the garb that belongs to literature, just as
they would resent the sale of cotton-seed oil under the name of lard.
However this may be I am bound to avoid even the appearance of any such
deceitful intent.

On the other hand there are people who depend almost entirely on the
newspapers for their reading matter. They seem to prefer the style of
the newspaper writers. Perhaps a book that is avowedly the work of a
reporter will meet their approval. At any rate I should be particularly
sorry to have any of them think, when the book is offered to them by the
bookseller, that it is anything different from what it is.

Then there is the pleading of the baby act in literature--the offering
of apologies for shortcomings and asking for the leniency of the reader.
I do not think I ought to do it. It is as if a dairy farmer, while
asking full price for his butter, should say: "I've a realizin' sense
that the smell haint just right. The dinged cows was eatin' leeks afore
I know'd it, but I done my best at the churnin' an' I hope ye'll make
allowances." If a buyer is looking for a book with the odor of flowers
and new-mown hay in it I do not think it is becoming to ask him to take
one flavored with garlic instead. Save for the matter manifestly from
books and records I obtained the facts herein by observation and
interviews; and I am willing to abide by the press law that a blunder is
inexcusable. It is, of course, the honest intent of the news-gatherer to
write his facts so that they will not be ignored or misunderstood or
forgotten, but when he fails to reach that standard he loses his market,
and he ought to lose it. And the man who essays the creation of
something permanent ought not to ask that he be judged by a lower
standard than that of the writers for "ephemeral publications."

I am under great obligations to many of the people whom I met in the
course of the journey, for assistance in gathering facts, but of the
whole number Mr. E. L. Baker, the American Consul at Buenos Ayres; Herr
Bruno Ansorge, of the Paramo Mining Company; Mr. Adolph Figue, a
merchant at Ushuaia; and Revs. John Lawrence and Thomas Bridges,
missionaries, were at especial pains to help me. I should like to thank
them again for what they did. And were I not prohibited from doing so I
would include one other name--that of the runaway sailor boy from New
York whom I found in the desolate harbor at the east end of La Isla de
Los Estados.

Having said this much I can very cheerfully face the inevitable--the
fact that the work will be judged by its merits. If it succeeds I shall
be glad, of course; if it fails I shall know better what to do next
time.

J. R. S.




CONTENTS.


                                     PAGE

CHAPTER I.
AFTER CAPE HORN GOLD                    1

CHAPTER II.
THE CAPE HORN METROPOLIS               27

CHAPTER III.
CAPE HORN ABORIGINES                   47

CHAPTER IV.
A CAPE HORN MISSION                    79

CHAPTER V.
ALONG-SHORE IN TIERRA DEL FUEGO       107

CHAPTER VI.
STATEN ISLAND OF THE FAR SOUTH        137

CHAPTER VII.
THE NOMADS OF PATAGONIA               151

CHAPTER VIII.
THE WELSH IN PATAGONIA                168

CHAPTER IX.
BEASTS ODD AND WILD                   183

CHAPTER X.
BIRDS OF PATAGONIA                    201

CHAPTER XI.
SHEEP IN PATAGONIA                    215

CHAPTER XII.
THE GAUCHO AT HOME                    228

CHAPTER XIII.
PATAGONIA'S TRAMPS                    250

CHAPTER XIV.
THE JOURNEY ALONG-SHORE               260




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.


                                                       PAGE

MAP OF THE CAPE HORN REGION                  _Frontispiece_

GOLD-WASHING MACHINES. PARAMO, TIERRA DEL FUEGO          14

PUNTA ARENAS, STRAIT OF MAGELLAN                         30

YAHGANS AT HOME(1)                                       48

THE MISSION STATION AT USHUAIA(1)                        92

USHUAIA, THE CAPITAL OF ARGENTINE TIERRA DEL FUEGO(1)   108

AN ONA FAMILY(1)                                        128

ALUCULOOF INDIANS(1)                                    134

GOVERNMENT STATION AT ST. JOHN. (FROM A
SKETCH BY COMMANDER CHWAITES, A.N.)(1)                  138

A TEHUELCHE SQUAW(1)                                    158

TEHUELCHES IN CAMP(1)                                   166

GAUCHOS AT HOME                                         228

AMONG THE RUINS AT PORT DESIRE, PATAGONIA               270

SANTA CRUZ, PATAGONIA(1)                                276

THE GOVERNOR'S HOME AND A BUSINESS BLOCK IN
GALLEGOS, THE CAPITAL OF PATAGONIA(1)                   282

Note 1: Reproduced by permission of Charles Scribner's Sons, from an
article, by the author of this book, in Scribner's Magazine, entitled
"At the end of the Continent."




THE GOLD DIGGINGS OF CAPE HORN.




CHAPTER I.

AFTER CAPE HORN GOLD.


If any of the readers of this book have an unrestrainable longing for
wild adventure, with the possibility of suddenly acquiring riches thrown
in as an incentive to endurance, let them pack their outfits and hasten
away to the region lying between Cape Horn and the Straits of Magellan
to dig for gold. Neither Australia nor California in their roughest days
afforded the dangers, nor did they make the showings of gold--real
placer gold for the poor man to dig--that have been, and are still to be
found in Tierra del Fuego, and the adjoining islands. Nor is the gold in
all cases too fine to be saved by ordinary rude sluices, for "nuggets as
big as kernels of corn"--the ideal gold of the placer miner--have been
found by the handful, and may still be had in one well-known locality if
the miner is willing and able to endure the hardships and escape the
dangers incident to the search.

But because of the hardships and dangers it is a veritable tantalus
land. There are many more skeletons of dead miners than authentic
records of wealth acquired in Tierra del Fuego, while those who have now
and again struck it rich and gotten clean off with the dust usually have
gone no further with it than Punta Arenas in the Straits of Magellan,
for Punta Arenas is to this region what San Francisco was to California
and Virginia City to the deserts of Nevada.

The story of the Cape Horn gold diggings is especially remarkable in
this, that the gold there should have remained undiscovered during the
centuries that passed after the first navigators landed in the region.
Consider that Magellan first saw Patagonia and the strait that bears his
name more than 350 years ago. Consider further the character of
Magellan, and the host of explorers that followed him. They were all
admirals, or bore other titles of high rank, and we call them famous,
but they were almost to a man notion peddlers--men who started out with
stocks of gewgaws and trifles which they were to swap for valuables.
Magellan went out, not to make himself famous as a navigator, but to
reach the Spice Islands by a shorter, and therefore more profitable,
route than that by the Cape of Good Hope. He was out for fortune, and
the fame of making discoveries was an incidental matter. And so for the
rest. They were not very particular or nice as to how they got gold to
ballast their ships. They plundered harmless people on the African coast
and elsewhere; robbed ships found under other flags than their own; even
sacrificed innocent human lives in their thirst for gold. Not one of
these greedy sailors and pirates but would have gone almost wild with
joy at the finding of a mine of gold.

And yet here, in the streams that empty into the Straits of Magellan,
even in the streams near Port Famine, where Sarmiento's colony starved
to death, and in the sands of the coast of Patagonia, were gold
diggings--the genuine placer diggings, as said. These navigators sailed
along with their eyes on the gold-bearing shores. They even filled their
water casks in the gold-bearing streams. It is likely that the time came
when scarcely a day in the year passed when some sailor's eye was not on
land in the Cape Horn region where gold could be found, but not until
the latter half of the nineteenth century was gold actually obtained
there.

Then, when gold was found, comes another curious feature of the story.
It probably took twenty years after the finding of the first
dust--twenty years, during every one of which, some gold was found in
the region--to create anything like a stir in the matter. I say probably
twenty years because the actual dates are not known.

The story of the Cape Horn mining region begins on the mainland of
Patagonia north of the Straits of Magellan, and it is at the beginning a
very hazy story. I could not learn definitely either the name of the
first man who found gold in the vicinity of the strait, or the exact
locality in which it was found. I talked with miners and merchants of
the region on the subject, but no one knew anything about it worth
mention. An _Official Memoria General_ on the subject of Mines, printed
in Buenos Ayres in 1889, says that "several years before 1867 it was
known that gold existed on the east coast of Patagonia, and also in the
little streams that run from different points of the Andes. This fact
has been confirmed in various places and at different times by Chilean
miners and shipwrecked seamen." And that is the best information I could
get on the subject.

Early in 1869 Commander George Chaworth Musters of the English navy,
visited Punta Arenas, en route for a journey across Patagonia with the
Tehuelche Indians. In one of the stores of the town, where he stopped
for the purpose of "purchasing tobacco and other necessaries," he found
some nuggets of gold. He speaks of them incidentally along with the
Indian weapons, girdles, and other curios, that the store contained, but
a Yankee sailor from the schooner _Rippling Wave_, who happened into the
store while Musters was there, became enthusiastic over it and said:

"Ah, that's the stuff we used to grub up in a creek in Californy. I
guess if the old boat lays her bones on these here shores, I'll stop and
turn to digging again."

In 1877 and again in 1878, Don Ramon Lista, an Argentine explorer and
writer, visited Punta Arenas, and on his return to Buenos Ayres he
printed his experiences in a pamphlet. In that he says:

     The creek called Las Minas that bounds the settlement on the north
     abounds in grains of gold; and from 1866 until 1877 many natives of
     the island of Chiloé have lived well on the daily product of their
     labors in washing the gold-bearing sand.

In the year 1876, a small schooner engaged in the seal fishery, and
commanded by a noted Argentine sailor, Don Gregorio Ibañez, was stranded
near Cape Virgin, the extreme southeast corner of Patagonia. The crew,
without exception, had the good fortune to escape to the land with some
provisions and other valuables, including a shovel. The shovel may seem
to be a novel tool for shipwrecked seamen to carry through the surf,
but Don Gregorio knew what he was doing.

Patagonia is a desert region very much like certain parts of the United
States. One may travel hundreds of miles without seeing a drop of sweet
water, and yet with a shovel water a-plenty may be had by him who knows
where to dig. Don Gregorio, having landed his provisions, put a man at
work digging in the sand not very far from the surf in search of water.
Whether he found water or not tradition does not tell. The story tellers
all forget about the water as they relate how, when the digger had
gotten down about three feet, he began to throw out a layer of black
sand such as no one of the crew had seen before--a black sand that was
dotted all over with little and big dull yellow particles. That was such
an odd-looking sand that Don Gregorio and the digger and all hands had
to take a proper look at it. And when they had taken this look, they
almost went crazy with excitement, because those yellow particles were
pure gold.

But, as I said, neither this discovery nor the gold that was dug from
Las Minas creek at Punta Arenas, nor the stories of these doings which
were carried to England and to California by ships passing that way, had
any effect in creating a rush to the diggings near the straits.

In explanation of this indifference, it may be said that the diggings,
even of Las Minas creek were, on the whole, rather lean. Instances of
considerable finds are mentioned by the old timers of Punta Arenas. Men
cleaned up the stuff by the ounce, in spots, but the run of what men got
was "mere day wages." The find of Don Gregorio's sailors was not
considered of any importance--the tiny nuggets were supposed to be a
stray deposit, and not indicating any bed of gold-bearing sand. The
stuff lay in the sand of the beach, and who had ever heard of such a
thing as placer diggings in the sand along the shore?

In 1877 as many as 120 men worked the sands of Las Minas creek and made
day wages at it. In the United States the fact that 120 men with hash
bowls could wash out even "mere day wages" would create a rush to the
region, while the finding of an occasional nugget "of the weight of 300
grammes," as occurred in Las Minas creek, would create a stampede, of
course, but in the Spanish-American countries the conditions and the
people are different.

However, a time came when even the people of Punta Arenas got excited.
The steamship _Arctic_ of one of the lines running through the strait
was, in 1884, wrecked on Cape Virgin very near the place where Don
Gregorio's sealing schooner went ashore. Like the inhabitants of the
Bahama Islands, the people of Punta Arenas used "to thank God for a good
wreck." The _Arctic_ was a remarkably good wreck, for she was a
well-found, handsomely fitted passenger ship. A motley crew of men
hastened from Punta Arenas to the beach at Cape Virgin, some to get what
they could from her lawfully, and some to get what they could in any
way. It is said now that some one of the number was familiar with the
story of what Don Gregorio's sailors found when digging for water, and
so the old story of gold discoveries there was retold as the gang smoked
and talked and sorted their plunder. Thereat some of them went digging
"just for luck," and found something more exciting even than the silk
fittings, chronometers, cordage, and anchors which they had taken from
the _Arctic_--they found gold.

One Fred Otten cleaned up seventeen kilos (37.4 pounds) of gold in the
course of two weeks, they say, and that sort of luck was enough to
rouse even the phlegmatic wreckers of the Straits of Magellan.

Here, then, at the wreck of the steamship _Arctic_, is found the real
beginning of the story of the Cape Horn gold diggings. In those days
Punta Arenas was a supply depot for a fleet of sealing schooners that
eventually destroyed the rookeries of the region to the south. The
sealing sailors took a hand in with the gold washers. They did more than
that. They had, as they would have said, a severe look at the ground
round about as well as at the layer of sand in which the gold was found.
The lofty banks--in fact, everything in sight from the beach--was what
geology sharps would call an alluvial formation. The lofty precipices
were composed of layers of clay, sand, pebbles, shells, the débris of
prehistoric seas and floods. In one of these layers--a layer that
cropped out under the tide waters--was gold galore. Jack couldn't
explain it, and he didn't want to; but when he had helped to skin the
gold-bearing layer from the clay as far as he could reach, he remembered
that he had seen just such beaches with banks behind them elsewhere--on
Tierra del Fuego, on New Island, on Lennox, on Navarin, on Wollaston, on
Hermit, on Cape Horn itself. He had seen those lofty banks from the
decks of sealing schooners, and he was game to go to them to see if
there was gold in the sand along the shore there as there was at Cape
Virgin. Why shouldn't there be? And there was.

Nor were the citizens of Punta Arenas the only ones excited by this find
of gold dust in the sand at Cape Virgin. The Argentine Government sent
an engineer to examine the region, and the opinion formed by the
engineer was that "the gold-bearing sands of Patagonia are richer than
those of California and Australia." So says an old public document.
Further than that, "there was much agitation in Buenos Ayres among
speculators in mines who had great hopes that grand fortunes might be
obtained easily in Patagonia. A great number of persons solicited from
the government concessions of mines of gold. But as the greater part of
the solicitors had never been in Patagonia, and were obliged to gather
their information from others as to the desirable points, it happened
that much confusion arose."

"Much confusion" just describes what happened. Many concessions were not
only issued on overlapping claims, but on the same claims, and there
were many heart-burnings and feuds over patches of sand that were not
worth anything.

One Don Gregorio Lezama, with a capital of $70,000, organized an
expedition, and sent it out with sluices and wind-mill pumps to supply
the sluices. They reached the diggings and set up both sluices and
pumps. Then they found that when the wind did not blow the pumps could
not supply the sluices with water, and when the wind did blow the men
could not supply the sluices with gold-bearing sand, because that sand
was found only where the waves would then prevent the work of the men.

So the wind-mill outfit was abandoned and another pumping arrangement to
be worked by mules was sent out. The record contains this paragraph as
to the subsequent doings:

     The company continued its operations for more or less months, and
     obtained some pounds of gold; but the general outlook was not very
     encouraging, the work was suspended, and the company liquidated
     itself.

So it happened, of course, to the majority of people who went in the
rush to Cape Virgin diggings. They eventually suspended operations and
liquidated themselves. Nevertheless a number had "struck it rich," and
that, as said, started the search for the precious metal along the
stormy coasts and under the towering precipices of the islands away
south to Cape Horn.

My first view of a Cape Horn mine camp was obtained on the east coast of
Tierra del Fuego. I had taken passage on an Argentine naval transport
that was bound on a voyage with supplies for the officials and troops at
various stations which the Argentine Government has established in
recent years throughout the region. To promote the development of its
territories the government carries prospectors and their outfits at very
moderate charges, considering the kind of navigation. Accordingly this
transport had on board four men and about three tons of provisions and
other supplies to be landed at El Paramo, the first mine camp
established on the east coast of Tierra del Fuego.

Paramo is a Spanish word meaning desert. It is a very good name for the
camp. When one has heard the story of this desert camp he will have
gained some idea of the life of a prospector and miner in the Cape Horn
region.

The founder of El Paramo was one Julius Popper, one of the pioneer
prospectors of Tierra del Fuego. He was, in fact, the first prospector
to make a journey across the island, though missionaries, of whom a
curious story will be told at another time, had explored it on another
quest. Popper was an engineer of rare attainments--a civil, mechanical,
and mining engineer--good in all three branches: an astronomer; a
linguist who spoke and wrote a dozen languages fluently. He could with
equal grace and precision conduct a lady to dinner or knock all the
fight out of a claim jumper. Unfortunately, when just beginning to
realize on his investments in Tierra del Fuego, he died at the hands of
murderers. He was poisoned in Buenos Ayres by men whom he had offended
in the south.

In the year 1886 the Cape Virgin diggings were so far worked out that no
more than day wages--a paltry $5 a day, as the miners call it--could be
had. Only the plodders would remain there, and Julius Popper was never a
plodder. So an exploring company of eighteen was gotten together, with
pack horses and a mining outfit, together with arms, ammunition, and a
permit from the Argentine Government to use them whenever necessary.

The landing was made at Future Bay, opposite Punta Arenas. It was in the
month of September, the spring of the southern latitude. Snow lay so
deep on the mountains that a track had to be cleared with shovels for
miles. Then the brush was elsewhere so thick that axes had to be used to
open a passage for miles, but after five days' labor they got to Santa
Maria River, where they found eight men at work on a sluice taking out
about 700 grains of gold a day. This was mere day wages, and they pushed
on until they reached Useless Bay, and then took an easterly course
which they held clear across the island, reaching the coast at the north
of San Sebastian Bay.

Here, in a tongue of sand that encloses the northeast side of the bay,
they found the gold they were looking for in a layer of black sand,
exactly like the layer that had been found at Cape Virgin, although
there was no bank of any kind behind the beach.

Having staked claims here they went away south, discovering and naming
capes, rivers, and ranges of hills, with here and there more placer
gold. It was an open prairie country, with a species of sagebrush on it
such as is found in Patagonia, but instead of a desert they here found
plenty of water everywhere, and sometimes too much in the shape of
swamps; but, unfortunately, the gold was usually found where there was
not a running stream within miles. It was apparent that all sluices
would have to be supplied by means of pumps.

Eventually they fell foul of the Indians. A shower of arrows came at
them from the brush, but all fell short. The number of Indians was
estimated at eighty, armed with bows. The eighteen white men turned
loose Winchesters in reply, the Indians lying down while the fire
lasted, and jumping up to discharge their arrows when it slackened. By
the time the magazines of the rifles were empty the Indians abandoned
the fight. One gets an idea of the quality of the white fighters from
the fact that but two of the Indians were killed, and the further fact
that when the fight was over Mr. Popper posed his men in the attitude of
troops repelling a charge, took a position himself astride one of the
dead Indians, and then had the outfit photographed for subsequent use,
on the cover of a pamphlet in which he described the journey he had
made.

To the camp called Paramo, that was established in consequence of
Popper's expedition, came, as said, the Argentine naval transport,
bringing four men and some tons of supplies, on the morning of May 12th.

Considering its age, the number of men employed--from thirty to forty--,
and the fact that it is also a government station, having a prefect, a
chief of police, a schoolmaster, a secretary to the prefect, and a squad
of soldiers to maintain the dignity of the officials, it was a
remarkable camp. There was just three buildings in sight--a
boarding-house for the miners, a home for the mine bosses, and a
combined stable and storehouse. The camp of the government was said to
be located two leagues back in the country. The buildings were of wood,
roofed with corrugated, galvanized iron. They were huddled together so
that they looked from the ship as one building. They were on the usual
mine-camp model of North America--one story high, box shaped, and with
small windows and no superfluous doors. A barbed wire corral stood at
one side of the buildings, which were located so near the beach that a
high surf at spring tide was sure to send the foam quite to the
foundations on which they stood. Indeed, one of them was protected from
the surf by a sort of a wooden sea wall.

Beyond the houses stretched a low yellowish grassy plain that was very
like a Nebraska prairie in appearance, and a league away to the north
rose a low range of treeless hills.

The diggings lay right in the beach. When Popper first discovered the
claim the black sand that contained the gold lay in a bed of from three
to four inches thick, that was for the most part under a layer of coarse
gravel two to three feet thick, though in some places the black sand was
found free of any cover at low tide.

Of the richness of the diggings in the early days it may be said that
the mine was discovered in September, 1886. Popper had to return to
Buenos Ayres and organize a company to work the deposit as well as
perfect his title to the claims according to Argentine law, and then
ship a steam pumping plant with sluices and material for the camp to
the locality. This all took time, and it was not until the end of the
following antarctic winter that he got his plant in operation. He was
then able to pass an average of fifty cubic yards of sand through his
sluices per day. From this he cleaned up in the course of the first
year, after the discovery, 154 pounds (weight avoirdupois) of pure gold.

As another indication of the richness of this territory, I can say that
we took on a government official who had been at the station two leagues
back considerably less than a year, but he had cleaned up enough gold to
satisfy him. He was going home to Buenos Ayres, rich. He had worked
diggings outside the Paramo claim, using common sluice boxes.

While this easily-obtained gold-bearing sand was being worked off, the
miners observed that the supply was renewed somewhat by every storm that
raged, and further, that when a storm happened to come at the time of
the spring tides, a very much larger quantity of gold-bearing sand was
washed up by the waves than in ordinary storms. This had happened, too,
at Cape Virgin, but the renewal of the gold supply by the storms was not
so notable there. However, it appears that eventually a time came when
the miners at Paramo were able to work off all the black sand between
storms. So it happened--so it happens in these days that the miners sit
down and smoke their pipes till the storm comes and goes. After the surf
of the storm is gone and the tide runs out, a fresh layer of black sand
is found with gold in it. The miners say the sand is washed up from a
streak that crops out somewhere below low tide. They think that this
layer could be reached by sinking a shaft near the buildings, but they
can't sink a shaft profitably on account of the water coming in. The
black sand lies on clay, and all the layer, and the other layers above
it, are, so to speak, afloat with water. So they work only after a heavy
surf. The weather, on the average, keeps them busy about half the time.

The land is controlled by a German-Argentine corporation, of which Herr
Carlos Backhausen and Herr Bruno Ansorge are superintendent and foreman.
The men work the sand on shares, and do so well that, paradoxical as it
may seem, there is difficulty in keeping a full gang of men at work. The
trouble is, that, as soon as the men get a few ounces of dust to their
credit, they must take it and go away to Punta Arenas and swap it for
such joys as may be had in that tiny metropolis.

At Paramo, on the beach, they now use a combination of wooden sluices
and a copper-plate machine with which all gold miners are familiar, but
which could not be briefly described here. The riffles in the sluices
save the coarser gold, while the mercury on the copper plates takes up
the flour gold as it drifts away over the plates. Water for all the
machines is pumped from the sea, and it is worth while telling that
experiments there show that some pay streaks can be profitably worked
with salt water when fresh water fails to save a satisfactory return.

Geologists find this gold-bearing layer of black sand (it is a magnetic
iron sand) a most interesting study. They say the deposit at Paramo is a
continuation of that found at Cape Virgin, and that deposit is found at
intervals on the Patagonia coast to the Gallegos River. The geologists
are even confident that it crops out at intervals for over a thousand
miles along the Patagonia coast--always below the water line. Of course,
this bed of sand was deposited where it is now found by the action of
water, and it must have existed at one time in the form of a reef or
vein a thousand miles long in some prehistoric range of mountains. What
a lead that would have been for some lone prospector!

[Illustration: GOLD-WASHING MACHINES. PARAMO, TIERRA DEL FUEGO]

Returning north from Paramo on the east coast of Tierra del Fuego, the
transport entered the Straits of Magellan and went to Punta Arenas. From
Punta Arenas we went down through Cockburn Channel to the Antarctic
Ocean, and then, turning east, cruised through Brecknock Pass,
Desolation Bay, Whale Sound, Darwin Sound, and Beagle Channel via the
Northwest arm. Thence we coasted along east and up through the Straits
of Le Maire on the north side of Staten Island, which we followed to St.
John Bay on the east end. These are positively the wildest, most
dangerous waters in the world. As will be told, the hidden reefs and the
whirling tornadoes formed combinations that made experienced travellers
look serious, although in a steamer that was as good a seaboat as ever
floated. And yet the prospectors of Punta Arenas have sailed all over
that route, summer and winter, in twenty-five catboats, looking for
gold.

At Ushuaia, the capital of Argentine Tierra del Fuego, a small village
in Beagle Channel, I fell in with Harry Hansen, a Punta Arenas
prospector, who for six months had been cruising about the islands to
the south of the channel, and was on his way home very much disgusted
with the life of a prospector. He, with a brother, had faced every kind
of a storm known to the Cape Horn region. They had been obliged to live
for weeks, as the Indians do, on limpets and clams only. Their only home
had been the tiny cabin of a 25-foot sloop. As a result of the six
months of hardship and work they had about twenty-five ounces of gold
dust. So they sold their sloop and took passage with us for the Gallegos
River. As we steamed along they told stories of gold hunting around Cape
Horn.

Lennox Island is just now the centre of interest in that region. Lennox
has high banks and sandy beaches, exactly like those of Cape Virgin, and
the gold is found in a layer of black sand that crops out below sea
level, and is washed up within reach by the waves. But, according to the
Hansens, the best of the diggings there were worked out. There was no
longer any fresh, unworked ground, with its layers of dust that could be
scraped up with a table knife at the rate of three kilos a day, and so
Lennox was not worth the attention of any enterprising prospector. The
plodders who were willing to carry mercury to put in the sluices, and to
sit down and wait for the storms to bring up fresh sand could make a
couple of guineas a day easily enough, but the Hansens did not want any
such wages as that.

Under the point of New Island, very appropriately called the Asses'
Ears, a wide beach was pointed out as the location where an
extraordinary find was made. A party from Punta Arenas had landed there,
and had sunk a wide shaft several feet into the sand, looking for the
gold-bearing layer, but without finding it, although the indications
along shore were good. They abandoned the spot after a day or two and
went away. Then another party came along some time later, and just for
luck concluded to sink the well a little deeper. That was the luckiest
conclusion they ever came to.

Within one foot they struck pay dirt, took out over 100 pounds weight
(48 kilos) within a month, and sailed away content. Their story, when
told at Punta Arenas, sent a host of eager fellows down there to get
what was left, and, singular to relate, about every man who went there
among the first three boat-loads did well. But when I was passing this
point only the smoke of the camp-fire of one lone gold-digger could be
seen faintly beneath the Asses' Ears. He was the last of the plodders,
according to the Hansens, and was likely to become as rich and as mean
as some folks they knew in Punta Arenas--men willing to get rich by
saving and scrimping out of a paltry $10 a day.

And then there was the little bay on the Tierra del Fuego mainland,
called Port Pantaloons. No man of any experience ever thought of landing
there to look for gold. One glance was sufficient to show that no gold
could be found there. So everybody supposed, at least. Instead of steep
banks, showing the well-known layer formation of Cape Virgin, was a
gentle, grassy slope, with a brook that came splashing down a woody
ravine. It was a pretty enough place--in fact, the scenery was probably
what made a party of seven greenhorns from Punta Arenas, out with a
little schooner, put in there and land.

Did I believe in the old saying "A fool for luck"? Well, if I didn't I
would after living in Punta Arenas a while. These seven greenhorns made
a camp and went washing for gold at Port Pantaloons. At the end of five
weeks to a day from the time they left Punta Arenas they were back
again, and had exactly four kilos of gold (say nine pounds) each. And
every man of them took the first steamer for Europe, intending to settle
down and live on the interest of his money instead of having a good time
in Punta Arenas, as he might have had.

Of course, there were a lot of people at Punta Arenas who made haste to
go down to Port Pantaloons to clean up what these greenhorns had left;
but, remarkable to tell, when the experienced miners came to wash where
the greenhorns had been, there was found nothing left to clean up. The
greenhorns had found a pocket, and had cleaned it themselves.

And then there were the Cape Horn group and New Year's Island off the
north coast of Staten Island. The Hansens had visited both localities
and had found, as they said:

     Plenty of the stuff, but it was too fine for our sluices without
     mercury. Besides, we didn't have a proper ship for these waters.
     She was only a ten-tonner. If you want the gold you can have it,
     but nobody from Punta Arenas will help you get it. It takes too
     much capital to set up copper-plate machines there, and those that
     have the capital haven't the pluck to face the sea in these waters.
     I suppose you could average fifteen grammes a day without mercury
     if that would satisfy you.

But of all spots in the Cape Horn region, Sloggett Bay, on the south
coast of Tierra del Fuego, about forty miles west of the Strait of Le
Maire, is the most tantalizing. More expeditions have been fitted out in
Punta Arenas to go to Sloggett Bay than to any two gold diggings
besides. Almost every expedition has gotten gold, and yet never did an
expedition there pay the outfitters. Indeed, more lives have been lost
trying for Sloggett Bay gold than at any two points besides. And that is
saying a good deal.

There is a man now in Punta Arenas who went down to this bay in a
well-built little schooner, which was manned by fourteen men all told.
They had heard of the gold found there--gold "in nuggets as big as
kernels of corn"--, and nothing should stop them in the work of getting
it, they said. They moored their little craft with long cables and
chains, and made everything as snug and safe as the most experienced
sailors and sealers could suggest. Then they went to work, stripping off
the six-foot layer of gravel that overlies the gold-bearing sand and
carrying the latter up out of reach of the waves; for they had to work
at low tide. The gold is all under water at high tide.

They were a hardy lot and enthusiastic. They worked all of every low
tide, and ate and slept during high water. They got on well with their
work, for a time, but they made a terrible mistake. They slept in their
schooner and kept no lookout--trusted to their moorings to hold them
fast. One night they went to sleep, as usual, well-tired from hard
labor. Then came one of those fearsome gales that characterize the
region. With a speed and power that are beyond description, it picked up
the schooner on the crest of a wave and dashed it into kindling wood on
the beach--dashed out the lives of thirteen of the men as well. One only
was left alive, and, curiously enough, he was entirely uninjured.

"The first I knew that there was a storm," he said, "was when I woke up
lying on the beach, with the wreckage around me."

This man did just what might be expected, they say, of any one of the
Cape Horn miners. He camped on the beach, and worked away at the pay
streak as best he could, until rescued by other prospectors; and he is
still a gold seeker in the Cape Horn region.

Sloggett Bay is really no bay at all. It is a roadstead with sheltering
walls on the northerly and westerly sides, and a very good bottom to
hold an anchor. It is about as much of a harbor as a ship would find on
the bar off Sandy Hook, save that there are mountains along shore
instead of low, sandy beaches. For a northerly or westerly gale the
shelter is as good as any one could wish, but the waves from the
southeast drive in with appalling fury. Indeed, any southerly gale is
dangerous, for the whirling squalls slew a small boat around until
broadside to the combers, and then the end comes before the unfortunate
gold hunter has time to think twice.

The gold of Sloggett Bay is marvellous gold. It is, as said, nugget gold
as distinguished from gold dust. The traditional "nuggets as big as
kernels of corn" are to be had there. I have seen them myself, and when
one has seen a handful of such stuff he does not wonder that prospectors
keep trying again and again, in spite of the fair certainty of death.

The pay streak at Sloggett Bay lies under water, as it does elsewhere
throughout the Cape Horn region, but it is harder to get, because it can
hardly be said to crop out at all. One must strip off about six feet of
sand and gravel at low tide, and then shovel out the pay streak, carry
it up clear of high tide, and there wash out the gold. Of course, when
the tide comes in again the space stripped of the covering sand is
recovered, and stripping must be done over again at the next low tide.
That is very discouraging work, but no form of coffer dam yet devised by
the miners has saved it.

They all agree that there is only one way in which the Sloggett Bay
field can be worked, and they think that that way would probably fail
too. The ideal Sloggett Bay outfit would be a big steam dredge, fitted
to scoop up sand, gravel, and pay streak all together, and after running
the stuff over the sluices and copper plates, to discharge the débris
in a lighter, that could be towed away and emptied in water too deep to
work. If such an outfit could hold on for a week, they say it would pay
for itself. If it could hold on for a month it would make its owners
rich. That it might hold on for a week or two is reasonably probable,
but the chances are that it would become a mass of wreckage even before
it reached the bay. The prospectors say that no dredge ever built for
harbor work could stand a southeast gale there for an hour, and yet the
sailors among them say that a dredge built specially for the work on the
lightship model, with proper ground tackle for mooring fore and aft,
could stand the gales there as well as the storms on the Georges Bank of
Massachusetts are weathered by the lightship.

Among the stories the miners tell of the luck they have had is one that,
whether true or false, is interesting, for even if false it shows that
the man who told it was an original liar; as a matter of fact, I have no
reason for doubting the story. Mr. Theo Benfield, whom I met in Punta
Arenas, said that during a journey from the strait up the coast he
stopped one day under one of the vertical earth banks called barancas in
that country to pick out a fossil that he saw protruding. The relic
proved to be a part of a mastodon's lower jaw, having two teeth still in
place. It was in bad condition, and he was about to throw it away, when
he saw that in a split in the top and side of one tooth was a bit of
some foreign substance to which he applied his knife. He found that it
was gold, that had, as he believed, been deposited there in fine grains
by the action of water, and that the grains had united as deposited. The
gold, as he says, was in a split in the tooth evidently made there when
the jaw was broken. He related the story in support of a theory in
regard to the origin of nuggets which he held, thus: Gold, as it comes
from the broken-down quartz veins is usually very fine, but as the
grains are carried along by the water they fall into little cavities,
where, by the action of chemicals in the water, they are united. The
split in the old tooth had at some time been lying in a place where gold
dust had silted into it until it was about full, and the particles
uniting had formed a curious nugget. Unfortunately Mr. Benfield was more
interested at that time in getting gold than in questions relating to
the origin of nuggets, and so smashed the tooth to get the stuff. He
got, he says, over eight grammes from the tooth. If his story be true,
he might have obtained many times the value of that much gold for the
relic intact, but he did not think of that at the time, and so we have
only one man's word in relation to the matter.

It is a remarkable fact that, in spite of all the prospecting done, no
gold-quartz veins have yet been found. Louis Figue, a merchant at
Ushuaia, in the Beagle Channel, showed me a specimen of nickel ore that
had yielded a remarkable per cent. on the first assay; but the only bit
of gold ore I saw or heard of was a small piece of free-milling stuff
belonging to Bruno Ansorge of Paramo. It was rich, but where the vein
was none could tell, for it was from a bit of drift rock called float by
the miners, and had been picked up between Useless and San Sebastian
Bays.

Very likely the placer gold found in all the streams of Tierra del Fuego
(stream gold as distinguished from that in the beach), and that in the
streams emptying into the Straits of Magellan, comes from veins yet to
be found up in the mountains where the streams rise. Very likely
systematic search would discover the veins. But the search would have to
be made under circumstances that would make the fair-weather prospectors
of Colorado and the grubstake eaters of the Mojave desert gasp. The
mountains of the Cape Horn region are snow-topped the year round. The
cold is not so intense as the early travellers would make one believe,
but there is a strength and a twist to the gales--especially a
twist--that is beyond description. And the gales come every day in
summer and every week in winter. Expeditions have traversed Tierra del
Fuego with horses, but the cheapest and the most comfortable way (in
spite of the danger) to prospect the region is from a well-found boat.
Moreover, every land expedition must contain enough men to keep up a
military guard, because of the hostility of the Indians, while two
well-armed, sober men, can defend a well-found boat from the savages,
and if skilful and cool can usually escape the danger of storms.

But neither from boats nor from a land expedition has any one as yet
been able to explore the higher parts of the mountain sides. Indeed,
where nothing else prevents it, the tropical luxuriance of the evergreen
beeches and magnolia brush heads off the hardy prospector. It is hard
work climbing up rocky gulches and declivities under the most favorable
circumstances, but when one must face fierce gales of wind and at the
same time hew his way through a solid mass of brush covering the whole
space to be explored, the task becomes too great even for a Yankee
prospector. It never has been accomplished, and possibly it never will
be accomplished; but, as they say very often down there, who knows?

There is not a mine camp in all the Cape Horn region south of the
strait, though Paramo, with its three buildings, and say thirty men, is
known as a camp. The placers, as found on almost every sandy beach of
the region, are all soon worked over, and thereafter pay only day wages.
So no camp or village springs up, as would happen were a rich true
fissure vein to be found. But Ushuaia, in the Beagle Channel, the
capital of Argentine Tierra del Fuego, has three stores and a small
mixed population, besides the troops that maintain Argentine dignity,
and, with its occasional Indian visitors, its happy-go-lucky
architecture, and its heaps of empty bottles, is not unlike a North
American mine town.

The headquarters of the Cape Horn miners will be found at Punta Arenas.
The peculiarities which makes Punta Arenas at once one of the most
interesting, and one of the most disappointing towns in the world, will
be described in the next chapter but it may be said now that miners'
supplies--picks, pans, clothing, and food--are cheaper here than at any
other miners' supply town in the world. But while a man may get these
things at a low price, he has to buy a boat instead of the burros he
would buy in the States to carry his outfit. A couple of burros cost say
$35 in Colorado, but here he must buy a sloop or a catboat, and he ought
to buy a schooner fifty feet long instead. Now any kind of a boat fit to
carry even the amphibious prospector of the Cape Horn region costs at
least $100 in gold, and must be fitted out at a cost of from $25 to $100
more, not to mention the mining outfit proper.

The prospecting sloop of the Cape Horn region is usually of the model of
the little oyster sloops to be found about the harbor of New York. The
hold is stowed full of provisions, tools for mining, and lumber for
sluices. Naturally these prospectors carry a much better supply of food
than prospectors elsewhere do. The Rocky Mountain prospectors with their
burros must needs be content with meal, beans, bacon, and, perhaps,
coffee, but in the Cape Horn region they carry a great variety of stuff
in tin cans and Chili claret by the half barrel. All this costs money,
but it is none too good for that climate. And even the best-provided
outfits are sometimes away from home so long that the supplies are
exhausted.

They sail away south feeling quite certain that they will be back soon
with their vessel ballasted with gold, but the shortest time spent away
from port by any party I heard of was that of the seven who returned
from Port Pantaloons in five weeks. The Hansens were away eleven months
in 1892-93.

Every year some sail away, and the sail disappears beneath the white
peak of Mt. Sarmiento, plainly seen from the water front of Punta
Arenas. After three or four months the "White Wings outfit" or the "Mary
G. outfit" is casually mentioned by the bar-room groups as one that
should be heard from before long. Two or three months later the outfit
is mentioned frequently and with ominous looks and shakings of the head,
while an anxious-faced wife or mother is seen hurrying to the beach
whenever a sail appears in the south, to learn if it be the one she
thinks of as she lies awake every night listening to the Cape Horn
gales. She goes down quickly, but she comes back slowly and with a dry
throat as she learns that it is neither the _White Wings_ nor the _Mary
G_.

The region seems but a narrow space as one looks at the maps, but it is
a wide one with labyrinthian channels and hidden bays, the ports of many
a missing sloop and catboat of which never a trace will be found to
tell the tale of disaster. It is a region where no man with a wife or
other person depending on him should enter, but for the young and
independent fellow, who can gain vigor and courage in facing the mad
freaks of an Antarctic gale, there is no place better than that beyond
the Straits of Magellan. He may not get rich--the chances are that he'll
be glad to work his way north in the stoke hole of some steamer--but he
will have had an experience that will make him contented to live
thereafter in the milder region of Uncle Sam's domain, and will,
moreover, fit him to make his way there better than he could have been
prepared in any other way.




CHAPTER II.

THE CAPE HORN METROPOLIS.


This is the story of what may be called the Cape Horn metropolis, for it
is the story of a town which, though a village in population, is the
business centre of the region extending from Port Desire, on the
Patagonia coast, to the little island whose southern angle is called
Cape Horn, and from the Falkland Islands on the east to the limits of
the islands on the west coast of the southern continent. Moreover, it is
a town whose characteristics are absolutely astounding, even to an
experienced traveller who visits it for the first time, and, curiously
enough, the more he may have read and heard about it the more he is
likely to be astonished when he at last sees it himself.

"La Colonia de Magallanes," as Punta Arenas is styled in the public
documents of Chili, is more than fifty years old, and that, to the
traveller looking at it from a ship's deck, is one of the most
astonishing statements made about the town. On "the 21st of April, 1843,
the Government of Chili planted the tri-color banner in the ancient port
of Famine, thus taking possession, in the name of Chili, of the Straits
of Magallanes," as the Chilian record says.

It is tolerably easy to guess that the Chili Government did this act
more from a sentimental desire to hold possession of the territory that
had been famous in history, than from any expectation that the region
would be worth the expense of holding.

Besides the desire to hold ground with historical associations, the
government wanted a penal colony that would be a very long way from the
capital. A penal colony, it was argued, would not only hold troublesome
convicts, but would serve as a place for employing members of the army
suspected of plotting a revolt against the government.

This colony at Port Famine depended entirely on supplies of food from
Valparaiso, and as navigation in those days was much more uncertain than
now, the settlement sometimes well-nigh repeated the experience of
Sacramento's colony, that in the sixteenth century starved to death
there. Because of their sufferings, the convicts rose up one day and
took possession of the settlement. The Governor was killed. Then a ship
happened along and the mutineers boarded it and compelled the crew to
sail on, but a Chilian man-o'-war overtook them, whereat the convicts
were for the most part hanged to the yard-arms. It is said that a man
was seen hanging from every yard-end on the warship, and she was a
full-rigged ship--had twenty-four yard ends to hang men to.

The buildings at Port Famine having been burned by the convicts, the
government decided to re-establish the colony just south of a long
tongue of sand made by a mountain stream emptying into the strait some
miles north of Port Famine. The new settlement was named from the old
one--La Colonia de Megallanes--but because of that tongue of sand it was
nicknamed Sandy Point by English-speaking seamen and Punta Arenas
(which means Sandy Point) by all others, and so the town is called by
everybody in the region.

As said, this was a place far out of the way. The life which the
unfortunates there had to endure may, perhaps, be imagined by those who
understand human nature, but not fully realized. Here were men condemned
to live shut off from all civilized associations because of crimes of
which they had been convicted. They were put in charge of men suspected
of trying to commit other crimes. In most cases keeper and prisoner were
guilty as charged, but in many cases both were innocent. In all cases
the keeper was an absolute monarch with the power, if not the right, to
take the life of any convict under him; and, for that matter, the
officers could shoot the soldiers without very great risk of adequate
punishment.

"It's coolish like the year round," said an old sailor there who had
known the town twenty-five years ago, "but when I saw the colony first
it wasn't a cable's length from hell."

That the colony did not remain a mere penal settlement with a mental
atmosphere like that of sheol was primarily due to the enterprise of a
Yankee from Newburyport, Mass., Mr. William Wheelwright, who founded the
steamship line called the Pacific Steam Navigation Company. This company
began running steamers through the Straits of Magellan in 1868, and they
all stopped at the colony perforce, because it was a convenient place to
take on coal from hulks that were kept there for the purpose. It was
natural that a trade in fresh meats and vegetables should grow out of
the coming of the steamers. And that trade was to Punta Arenas what a
long drink of Chili claret is to the wayfarer from the Patagonia desert.
It brought a new life to the place. On the day the first steamer called
the population was 195 souls. In 1872 it numbered 800.

Then other elements of growth appeared. There was the gold, for
instance, as told in the last chapter. The gold did not bring a
stampede, but it affected the population in a curious fashion.

"Men don't have to slave it for a boss in a gold camp. When they get out
of grub they can take a pick and shovel and go dig some gold," said Mr.
H. Grey, a Yankee merchant there. As the abundance of food affects the
increase of wild animals, so the certainty of earning a living affects
the growth of a human population.

But Punta Arenas grew from one cause that had nothing natural about it,
save as some seafaring people seem to be naturally of a devilish
disposition. One of the most prominent promoters of the growth of Punta
Arenas was the hard-fisted Yankee skipper--he who commanded the sealer
and whale ship fitted out in New London or New Bedford to skin the
rookeries of Staten Island and others farther south. Not that the
skipper deserved thanks or praise from the people of Punta Arenas or any
other people in this matter. He did not do it intending to promote the
prosperity of Punta Arenas or its people. The skipper who helped the
growth of Punta Arenas was an infamous scoundrel, who got sailors to
toil and drudge for him until they had filled his ship with skins and
oil, and then by cruelty that is shocking to consider drove them ashore
at Punta Arenas that he might rob them of their hard-earned wages. Some
other sea captains than Yankees have driven sailors ashore there, too,
but the Yankees have done the most of it.

[Illustration: PUNTA ARENAS, STRAIT OF MAGELLAN.]

Nine tenths of the population with whom I talked had been sailors. Not
all had been hazed from ships, but the majority had.

Last of all came the one industry that was to make Punta Arenas the
antarctic metropolis. Mr. H. L. Reynard, an Englishman living in Punta
Arenas, rented Elizabeth Island early in the seventies, and brought some
sheep there from the Falklands. The sheep took kindly to their new home,
and increased so rapidly that Mr. Reynard soon had to move some of them
to the mainland. They say he now owns over 100,000 sheep, besides horses
and cattle galore, and enjoys--really enjoys--an income of not far from
£400 per week.

The people of Punta Arenas did not wait until Mr. Reynard became rich
before following his example. They began to invest in sheep as soon as
they saw that sheep were profitable, and so far as I could learn every
man there who had gone into the business and had given it ordinary care
had made money. So the sheep spread far and wide over the region, and
men came to care for them and Punta Arenas was the point to which all
these men came for supplies. And, as has happened elsewhere, so here the
rearing of cattle and horses goes along with the rearing of sheep.

It appears that during the early years the garrison in charge of the
convicts numbered on the average sixty soldiers of the line. Besides
these the government employed a lot of men to hunt the guanaco and the
cattle that ran wild in the Cordilleras, in order to keep the garrison
supplied with meat, and, incidentally, to help the soldiers hunt runaway
convicts of whom not a few were found brave enough to face the terrors
of the Patagonia desert for the sake of liberty. Such tales as may be
gathered of the doings and sufferings of these runaways are almost
beyond belief. To follow the beach to the Santa Cruz River, a journey of
from two to three weeks, subsisting on the few raw fish that might be
cast up by the sea, and passing two days at a stretch without water,
were matters of common experience. To wander inland and perish miserably
while striving to reach a mirage lake often happened.

However, it was not so much for the love of liberty that men fled from
the Punta Arenas prison, as it was because they could not endure the
sufferings peculiar to their situation. It was because officers as well
as soldiers of the line and convicts were in exile, and because the
worse instincts of the officers were brought out by the hardships they
endured. In such a penal settlement as that was matters naturally went
from bad to worse, and a second mutiny was inevitable.

On the night of November 10, 1877, the soldiers and convicts united to
take the town, and succeeded. And for three days they held it. They
caught the commander of the garrison and revenged the cruelties of which
he had been guilty by cutting off his nose, cutting out his tongue,
putting out his eyes, hacking off his limbs, and last of all severing
his head from his body, and setting it upon a pole at the prison gate.
With equal animosity they sought the Governor and the chaplain, but both
had fled in time, the former deserting his wife and children that he
might save his own skin whole. Then the mutineers sacked the town and
lived riotously until a Chilian man-o'-war appeared in the offing, when
they gathered their plunder together and started away, according to one
account, 180 in number, and, according to another, in a mob numbering
120. Incredible as it may seem, these mutineers, although they had
forty horses in all, took not one scrap of food with them. Instead of
food they loaded themselves and the animals with clothing, bales of dry
goods, fancy cutlery, bric-à-brac--almost anything and everything the
town afforded that would be of no benefit in the journey that was before
them.

The Chilian authorities made no pursuit worth mention, though a handful
of men well armed and mounted could have rounded up the whole company.
Unmolested they marched away. The first night they killed three horses
for food. The next night and the next and the next they continued to
kill horses. They kept at it till all were gone. Other horses were
captured from incoming Gauchos, but these did not suffice. Many
mutineers were killed in murderous quarrels, but more died because of
the hardships of the route. They found freedom on the desert pampas, but
hunger and thirst overtook them, and crawling beneath the scant shelter
of the thorny bushes growing there, they died, and the foxes and
vultures ate them.

At the end of three months a company of forty reached the Welsh
settlement on the Chubut River, and these were carried to Buenos Ayres
by the Argentine Government, and were there eventually turned loose.

With the burning of the prison an incubus that had weighed upon Punta
Arenas vanished. The town was free to rise and flourish as the exuberant
fancy of its people might dictate, for the prison was never rebuilt.

I first saw Punta Arenas on the 15th of May, 1894. I was on the deck of
the Argentine naval transport _Ushuaia_, and the reader should remember
that May there corresponds to November in the North, while the latitude
of the Magellan region is precisely that of the coast of Labrador. With
these geographical facts in mind, the appearance of things about Punta
Arenas was astonishing, for it was a waterside settlement, backed by
grassy, rolling hills, above which rose mountains green with verdure
that never fades. Indeed, but for the snow-capped peaks away back in the
Cordilleras, one would have had hard work bringing himself to realize
that this was the Magellan of which the early navigators drew such bleak
pictures. And yet Port Famine, where Sarmiento's colony starved to
death, was but a few miles away to the south,--in sight, in fact, from
the masthead. The general aspect of the scenery beyond the settlement
was very much like that to be found in the Adirondacks after an early
snow has whitened the higher peaks, leaving the foot-hills showing
darker and greener by contrast.

But the similarity to an Adirondack picture ended at the village limits.
There is nothing in the New York wilderness, nor yet in the camps that
are found in the Rocky Mountains, that may be compared to Punta Arenas
as it appeared from the water. Four streets ran from the beach up over
the gentle slope--streets yellow with sand, then black with mud and
glistening bright with pools of stagnant water. A stirring population
kicked up sand and mud and splashed through the water. Between these
streets and facing them were massed, of course, the houses--wall after
wall and roof after roof, almost every wall of wood and every roof of
corrugated iron, the exceptional walls being made of iron, like that in
the roofs. But more singular still was the fact that every building
appeared new--a shining mass of pine boards and zinc-white iron, save in
those cases where paint had been used, and these houses looked more
conspicuous even than the rest, for the prevailing color of paint was a
brilliant pink.

The harbor, which is simply an open roadstead, was by no means
uninteresting. A great line steamship, as trim looking as a man-o'-war,
was at anchor discharging and taking in cargo from big lighters
alongside. A great German bark lay beside a big hulk, into which it was
discharging coal brought from Cardiff. A handsome little man-o'-war of
the cruiser type floated the tri-color flag of Chili above her quarter
deck. And besides these a whole fleet--a score or more of schooners,
sloops, and catboats, the trading and prospecting fleet of the
region--bobbed about and tugged at their cables under the impulse of a
smart wind from westward, while lighters and small boats were passing to
and fro among the vessels at anchor.

One of the small boats came alongside with a grocery salesman seeking
orders, and when it went away I went along. It was a clean-lined yawl,
with able seamen at the oars, but it could not travel fast enough to
please me.

I had seen mine camps in the Rockies, and in the deserts of
California--Creede and Death Valley; I had camped with cowboys and
shepherds in Jackson's Hole beyond the Teton Mountains, on the plains of
No Man's Land, and in the forks of the Red River of the South; I was
acquainted with the life of lumbermen in the Adirondacks and the wilds
of Nova Scotia; and I had sailed from the Arsuk fiord in Greenland to
Chicago. But here was a town with pink roofs that sheltered at once the
miner, the prospector, the cowboy, the lumberman, and happy-go-lucky
Jack. What might not one expect in the way of wild life in such a town
as this?

A long wood-and-iron pier furnished a landing for passengers, and at the
head of this stood a new wood and iron hotel, two stories high, and
having a bar-room in the corner next to the pier. I registered there
under the eye of the clerk, who also served as bartender. My
observations of this man were encouraging. He was talking French to one
customer and Spanish to another as I entered. He addressed me in English
when I came in, and then a moment later opened a door behind the bar and
called for hot water in German. Judging from what I saw later still,
when a pretty girl passed, I should say he was not unfamiliar with the
sign language. He also knew how to mix hot whiskeys. After a little talk
about the variety of people in the population of the town, I determined
to take a look at the gambling-houses of the place by daylight, so I
said:

"How many sporting houses in town?"

The barkeeper smiled blandly.

"A plenty," he said; "you'll find the best looking girls in the second
house beyond the postoffice right up this street."

"I meant gambling-houses," said I, "but since you've mentioned sporting
women, how many dance-houses does this place support?"

"One. It's the house I mentioned. Both the girls like to dance, but of
course one of them has to furnish the music. They've got one of
these--how do you call them--pianos that turn with a crank, eh? It's a
fine instrument, I tell you. Of course, if you want to take a chum along
you can get a boy to turn the crank."

"Wait," said I. "What was the number of the biggest gang of cowboys you
ever saw come to town?"

"I suppose as many as twenty."

"Did they have any money?"

"You bet they did."

"And did they spend it?"

"As quick as the Lord would let 'm."

"How many men have you seen coming from the diggings with dust?"

"Half a dozen, maybe. Why?"

"Did they blow in the dust?"

"Well, rather."

"And yet there is only one dance-house in town and that has but two
women in it?"

"That's just the size of it."

"Let us return to the subject of gambling-houses. How many have you?"

"One."

"Do they have big play there?"

"That's what they do--sometimes."

"Where is it? I'd like to see it."

"Um--"

The barkeeper hesitated a moment, and then went to the door and looked
up and down.

"I don't see a member anywhere," he said, "but some of them will be in
at dinner, and I'll introduce you."

"Does one need an introduction to get in?"

"Certainly."

"What! Police watch it in a town like this?"

"Police? No. It's a private club, gentlemen, eh? They would admit you on
your card, I dare say, but it pleases the army and navy members to
observe the usual formalities. Did you think it was run like a saloon?"

As was said, Punta Arenas is a town whose characteristics are absolutely
astounding, even to an experienced traveller. Cowboys, shepherds,
lumbermen, miners, and sailors gather there to waste their substance in
riotous living, and do so waste it, but there is not one public
gambling-house in town, and the one lone dance-house there has but two
girls in it and a hand-organ for music.

"How long have you been in this town?" said I to the drink mixer.

"About twelve years."

"Professional gamblers ever come to town?"

"I think so--one came. He was a Yankee, they say."

"What made you think that?"

"Well, we were up in Bray's billiard saloon. Bray is the boss billiard
player of this town, and he was showing us some fancy shots, when a
stranger dropped in and had a drink, and then we sat around and chatted.
But Bray wanted to play billiards, and so pretty soon he asked the
stranger to take a cue. The stranger said he liked to play billiards,
but it was not worth while to play against the boss player of the town.

"'Never mind that,' said Bray. 'We'll play for the drinks and see how we
match.'

"So they began. The stranger was a pretty fair player, and pretty soon
Bray had to do his best, though by doing his best he managed to beat the
stranger. I think it was thirty-two or thirty-three points. The stranger
showed interest in the game, but was going to put down the cue, when
Bray said:

"'I'll just give you thirty points and beat you for ten dollars.'

"The stranger showed eagerness at once, and putting up the cash went at
it. That was a right pretty game, let me tell you, for both men played
well, but at the last Bray ran out, although the stranger had but one
point to make. The stranger looked excited when Bray ran out, and
taking out a wad said:

"'I'll bet you one hundred, or two hundred, or three hundred you can't
do that again.'

"'I'll go you for three hundred,' said Bray. It was just what Bray had
been aching for.

"It was Bray's first shot, and he made a string of nine. Thereat the
stranger took his cue, chalked it, winked at the crowd, and ran out his
string without a break. Then he picked up the cash, stuffed it in his
pocket, and started out, whistling _Yankee Doodle_. We judged by that
circumstance that he was a Yankee."

I was in Punta Arenas four days, and talked with a variety of people,
but that was the only gambling story worth telling that I heard. I asked
if fights and bloodshed were known to the town since the convict mutiny.
They replied that fights were not unknown, but were rare.

"Do the fighters never kill each other?"

"I fancy not," said the barkeeper.

"Ever had cold-blooded murders for money?"

"Not in my day, anyhow."

"Then you've never lynched anybody here."

The barkeeper laughed.

"That's just like a Yankee," he said. "The only lynchings I ever heard
of took place in the States. The government keeps soldiers here, and
everybody is afraid of them."

This last statement explained why the town was peculiar. The government
is monarchial in fact, though nominally republican. Chili is ruled, as
all Latin-American countries are, by the army. Punta Arenas is ruled by
an army officer sent from Santiago. The town ordinances are backed by
bayonets. The Texas town marshal in all his glory could not keep the
peace as soldiers can. The government has decreed that there shall be no
gambling-houses in Punta Arenas of the style found in United States mine
camps. Neither shall there be dance-houses. Instead of these, drinking
saloons are permitted in unlimited numbers, and one or two young women
can get a license for a saloon as readily as a man can.

There are almost one hundred licensed bars in Punta Arenas. They are
found scattered everywhere about town. The young women who own saloons
commonly sit in the doorway knitting or sewing in the daytime. One who
saw them said their trade would probably be larger if they remained
behind the bar or wore veils. A more wretched-looking lot of women was
never seen in the saloon business. It is in little wooden shanties, with
corrugated iron roofs--utterly barren, squalid shanties--that the
riotous living of Punta Arenas is found, and there is not one bright or
picturesque feature about it to give excuse for its existence.

After leaving the bartender at the hotel, I started out to see so much
of the town as could be observed in walking the streets. It is a town
laid out on the checkerboard plan, and like all Spanish-American towns
has a plaza or public square. The streets are unpaved. This means that
near the beach, where there is sand, the wheeling is pretty fair, save
in the driest weather, and elsewhere is pretty bad when fair on the
beach, and good when it is bad on the beach. But one can find much
deeper mud even in the outskirts of New York city than is found in the
streets of Punta Arenas.

The sidewalks are peculiar. Under a village ordinance every such walk
is edged with a six-inch square timber. Between this timber and the
front wall of the house could be found, in a few places stone, in fewer
tile brick, in some well-packed beds of sand, but in the majority of
cases little narrow lakes of water securely held in place by the timber
sea-wall. The plaza showed a rich black loam and nothing else.

Facing the plaza was the old official residence of the Governor. It was
one of the few buildings remaining from the early days. It was a wooden
structure that had originally had a shingle roof over all, but the
moss-grown shingles had rotted away in patches, and had been replaced
with odds and ends of board, tin, and sheet-iron. The contrast between
the Governor in his gorgeous uniform and his official house was
something stunning. The home was the only real shabby building in town.

The traveller who lands in Punta Arenas and fails to climb the hills
behind the town makes a mistake, because the picture is wonderfully
beautiful and striking as well. The yellowish hills of Tierra del Fuego
rise up in the east beyond the broad waters of the strait. The
snow-capped peaks of Mt. Sarmiento and its neighbors appear above the
horizon at the south, while in the west the evergreen mountains rise
boldly up from the water's edge. And then, right at the foot of these
dark-green mountains lies the zinc and pink town, the most absurd
foreground to a magnificent landscape that ever was imagined.

The lower hills to the northwest of the town have been chopped over in
part and are covered with dead trunks of trees, giving the landscape the
appearance of what the early settlers in the forest districts of the
United States called a deadening. The trees seemed to have been killed
by some kind of an epidemic. They say in the town that the trees were
killed by lightning, but I did not see any marks of lightning on the
trunks. However they died, the landscape there is wild enough to please
an insane artist.

The only manufacturing industries of the place are the saw-mills and a
brick-yard. The saw-mills are located some distance from the village,
and are not novel, but the brick-yard is right at hand. I examined the
brick, and found a product that I had not seen equalled since I saw the
courthouse in Greer County, Tex., which had crumbled under a summer
squall. Even the hardest burned brick in this kiln could be broken with
the naked hands.

A worse industry than brick-making, however, was started some years ago
in the town. What they called a vein of coal was discovered some five
miles from the beach, and, after some talk, a company was formed to
exploit it. A pier was built at the beach, a railroad laid thence to the
mine, and rolling stock brought out from England. This done, they found
that they had a lignite instead of a coal mine. The pier has gone to
pieces, and the old locomotive could be seen partly buried in the sand
not far from the head of the ruined pier. This is the coal of which all
the writers who have visited the strait speak enthusiastically.

However, the town is going to have more industries, and there is to be
still more business done by the traders. The increase in the number of
sheep will soon compel the traders to establish a freezing establishment
there in order that their surplus sheep may be shipped to market. Just
now they sell their surplus to men wishing to establish ranches up
country, but there will soon be no more room for new ranches up country.

Then Punta Arenas may yet manufacture goods from its wool, and it could
very profitably tan its products of hides and skins. The region produces
a bark so rich in tannin that it could be profitably exported to the
States, but still more profitably used on the ground. The Chili
Government will make liberal concessions to any man who knows the
tannery business and has the capital to establish it there. But one must
have the knack to get along comfortably with odd people if he would
succeed in any business there.

The sales of merchandise in the town are naturally large in certain
lines, and they are particularly satisfactory to the merchants, for the
reason that many original packages are called for. It is a wholesale
trade to a remarkable degree. Moreover, the merchants deliver goods to
customers by means of sailboats instead of by wagons, as New York
merchants do. But, one scarcely need add, there is no free delivery by
boats. The navigation of the straits region is hazardous, and therefore
expensive. Only the hardiest sailors will undertake the handling of a
25-foot catboat where, to quote Capt. Samuel Wallis, one of the early
navigators, "even in midsummer the climate was cloudy, cold, and
tempestuous."

The business feature of the town that interests travellers most is that
of the dealer in Indian-made goods and curiosities. Indians from the
pampas and from the southern islands come to Punta Arenas to sell skins,
furs, feathers, baskets, arrow-heads--what not. The dealers find sale
for more stuff, in fact, than the Indians bring, so they have some goods
made to order in the town. The goods are all sold as genuine Indian-made
things, and in a way so they are. There are squaws in town who make a
living doing work of this kind. I saw one of them deliver an armful of
rugs made of guanaco skins to one of the dealers. She was dressed in a
tailor-made suit of good material; she had gold jewelry a plenty, and
her hair was banged across her forehead. The dealer said she was a
half-breed Tehuelche, and I did not doubt it, but when one buys
Indian-made relics he does not suppose that the Indian wore a
tailor-made suit and bangs. I asked Luis Zanibelli, who was formerly a
Maiden Lane jeweller in New York, and is now in the relic business
there, how to tell goods made in the wilds from those made by half-breed
squaws with bangs.

"That's easy," he replied. "Smell of the goods. The genuine Indian goods
from the pampas or the islands always smell bad."

The club of which the barkeeper had spoken as a gambling resort is an
oddity in name, if in no other way. It is called the "Cuerpo de
Bomberos," and that translated into English means the body or society of
firemen. There is a neat little red club-house, built somewhat on the
model of ancient colonial mansions in the States--that is, with pillars
in front. There is a yard full of flower-beds in front of that, and
there are flowers there in May, at least, if not later. The house is
furnished as club-houses are elsewhere, except that it has no kitchen.
The annual dues amount to less than a dollar a month gold, and for this
the members have a remarkably pleasant resort. The barkeeper thought the
play was heavy; this is interesting as showing what is considered heavy
play at Punta Arenas. The heaviest loss of which I heard was 400 paper
dollars--a trifle over $100 gold. The favorite game is baccarat, but the
seductive influences of draw poker are not unknown. The list of members
includes the merchants, sheep-owners, and officials living in the
vicinity or stationed there by government, and in Punta Arenas the word
vicinity covers a territory a hundred leagues away from the centre.

Speaking of the flowers in front of this club-house reminds me that
Punta Arenas is the greatest town for flowers I ever saw. Every house
has window gardens, and many houses have bays and rooms set apart for
great masses of potted flowers and shrubs. It has many more flowers in
proportion to the population even than the tropical cities like Rio.
Flowers grow wild there in great profusion, too, among which the wild
fuschias make the most profuse display, while the ferns and lichens are
something to delight the eye of even the least observant.

For the rest, Punta Arenas claims a population of 3500. It is not unlike
some United States towns in the matter of a local census, but after
making due allowances for local pride and enthusiasm, it still is found
a live and growing village. Lots in the business part of the town now
sell for pounds sterling where paper dollars would have sufficed ten
years ago. Indeed, a lot was sold while I was there for £500 that
changed hands in 1886 for $400 national currency. The old settler goes
about the street bewailing the fact that he didn't buy when he first
came, and saying it is too late now. But those who buy now point to the
growing traffic through the straits, and refer to the line of huge steam
tugs now building in England that will tow sailing ships through the
narrow waters and against the winds that vexed and baffled the early
navigators; they speak confidently of the spread of sheep ranches on
Tierra Del Fuego, and the apparently unfailing discoveries of new
gold-fields among the islands to the south; they talk of the increased
demand for the wood of the straits. They balance against the frosts and
cold rains of midsummer the many Indian summer days of winter, and tell
stories of invalids regaining health that would make both Denver and Los
Angeles green with envy. They find, in fact, no end of signs of future
prosperity for their austral metropolis, and if somebody does not dig a
canal from the Caribbean Sea to the Pacific they are very certain to
find these signs well founded. Even if such a canal is made, only one
element of the prosperity of the place will be injured--the traffic
through the straits--and that probably will not be wholly destroyed,
while the other elements can scarcely fail to improve continually.

Mr. Julius Popper wrote in 1888 of Punta Arenas, that it was "a town
that opened its doors at 11 A.M., and was more concerned about picnics
and dances than business." Mr. Frank Vincent said in 1889, that it was a
community scarce one of whom "would be willing to stay if he could get
away." The people there say these remarks were libellous when written. I
am bound to say that in 1894, if a man wanted to get to windward of a
Punta Arenas man in the matter of business, it was necessary to get up
in the morning before crow peep. And as for the people wishing to get
away, one would have hard work to find a citizen there who could be
driven away with a shotgun.

In spite of its climate and its government, it is a blooming and booming
community, and because of the enterprise of its citizens it deserves all
the prosperity the free pastures of the pampas and the waves of the sea
are bringing to it.




CHAPTER III.

CAPE HORN ABORIGINES.


This is the story in part of one of the most interesting and most
unfortunate tribes of Indians known in the history of American
aborigines--interesting because of their remarkable qualities of mind
and body, and unfortunate because they have been almost exterminated by
changes in their habits, wrought by Christian missionaries. It begins
with what was said of them and their country by the early explorers, and
it ends where the missionaries began what was intended to be the work of
civilizing them. It tells of the race as God made it. What the white man
did for it will be told later.

The Cape Horn Archipelago, as the islands south of the Straits of
Magellan may be called, contained when discovered, and still maintains,
three distinct tribes of Indians. One tribe occupied the island of
Tierra del Fuego to the north and east of the coast range of mountains,
of which Mts. Darwin and Sarmiento are the chief peaks. It was a land
tribe; that is, they rarely if ever built canoes, and they subsisted
almost entirely on such products as the land afforded. Another race
occupied the islands to the west of Cockburn Channel. They were always,
so to speak, a race of sailors; they built canoes, cruised about their
region as fancy or the prevalence of food dictated, and were very little
dependent on land beasts for food.

Last of all, we come to the tribe that lived and now exists among the
islands lying south of Tierra del Fuego and along the very narrow south
beach of that great island itself--a tribe that might well be called the
Antarctic Highlanders, since they live further south than any other
known people--and the land they occupy is but a succession of mountain
peaks. These people are known as the Yahgans.

The known history of the Yahgans begins in the stories told by the early
navigators of the region--a brief matter--merely the record of what the
early navigators saw of them--but it is worth printing in part here
because it is interesting, and because the reading of the mistakes made
by the early travellers will help to impress on the memory the
peculiarities of this remarkable tribe.

Darwin, the naturalist, under date of December 25, 1832, wrote of the
Yahgans:

     While going one day on shore near Wollaston Island, we pulled
     alongside a canoe with six Fuegians. These were the most abject and
     miserable creatures I anywhere beheld. On the east coast the
     natives, as we have seen, have guanaco cloaks, and on the west they
     possess sealskins. Among these central tribes the men generally
     have an otter skin, or some small scrap, about as large as a pocket
     handkerchief, which is barely sufficient to cover their backs as
     low down as their loins. It is laced across the breast by strings,
     and according as the wind blows it is shifted from side to side.
     But these Fuegians in the canoe were quite naked, and even one
     full-grown woman was absolutely so. It was raining heavily, and the
     fresh water together with the spray trickled down her body. In
     another harbor not far distant, a woman who was suckling a recently
     born child came one day alongside the vessel and remained there out
     of mere curiosity while the sleet fell and thawed on her naked
     bosom and on the skin of her naked baby! These poor wretches were
     stunted in their growth, their hideous faces bedaubed with white
     paint, their skins filthy and greasy, their hair entangled, their
     voices discordant, and their gestures violent. At night five or six
     human beings, naked and scarcely protected from the wind and rain
     of this tempestuous climate, sleep on the wet ground coiled up like
     animals. Viewing such men one can hardly make oneself believe that
     they are fellow-creatures and inhabitants of the same world....
     There is no reason to believe that the Fuegians decrease in number.

[Illustration: YAHGANS AT HOME.]

Quotations might be multiplied but two or three brief ones relating to
the land in which the Yahgans lived will suffice: King says that "the
vegetation is magnificent in some places, and under the shelter of the
great forests some plants are found that would be considered delicate in
England." Captain Cook agrees with this, and describes the wild celery
as among the delicate vegetable productions, but he concludes that "it
is the most savage country I have seen. There is no place in the world
which offers such desolate landscapes." To this may be added the
testimony of Admiral Anson, who said emphatically that it was "the most
horrible country which it was possible to conceive."

On the whole, it appears from reading the stories of these early
navigators that the land of the Yahgans, while lacking the eternal ice
of the Eskimo land, was bad enough, and in the matter of storms it was
worse even than the region of Baffin's Bay. As for the difference in the
people, it is apparent that the Yahgans were believed to be far more
wretched than the people of the North, because the Eskimos were clothed
in the warmest of furs and lived in huts, which, if made of ice and
snow, were still perfect shelters from the furies of the storms, while
the Yahgans went naked and often slept unsheltered from the snow and the
freezing sleet that fell in every month of the year.

The islands on which are found the homes of the Yahgan Indians are
almost without exception mountains that rise from the depths of the
Southern Sea. As one sails among them the idea that here is a mountain
chain that at some time long past was suddenly submerged in the sea is
irresistible. For miles and leagues one may coast along without finding
a beach wide enough to furnish a foothold, not to mention a place for
hauling up a yawl. That the mountain is as precipitous below the water
as it is above is easily proved, for soundings with the deep-sea lead
line often give 60 to 100 fathoms within 100 feet of the shore line.

Rising to the height of 1500 to 2000 feet, these precipitous mountain
peaks are lacking in nothing to make them grand and impressive. That
they seemed desolate to the early navigators none need doubt, however,
for the old-time sailors had a ship wretchedly unfit for such stormy
seas, and he was ill-clad, half-fed, and homesick. No mountains seen
through riffs in storm clouds and between marching columns of freezing
rain could seem pleasant to them.

But wherever there is shelter from the prevailing gales a narrow beach
is found commonly. Above this grows a forest of trees, of which the
greater number are the antarctic beech, and nearly all the rest are
species of magnolia. Some grow to a diameter of two feet and a height of
fifty. Nearly all of the trees are green the year round, and the
magnolias are of a particularly bright and beautiful green.

As one climbs the mountains the trees are seen to be of smaller and
smaller sizes until at from 1000 to 1500 feet above the sea mosses take
the place of trees. Above the mosses come barren rocks and eternal
snows. In many parts of Beagle Channel, and especially at the east end,
there are fairly level spaces bordering the water, with foot-hills that
are rolling instead of craggy. Even at the foot of Mount Misery, on the
east end of Navarin Island, a mountain that got its name from the
severity of the gales that come from its gulches, the scenery is
anything but desolate and horrible. Indeed, natural grassy meadows and
green groves so alternate with park-like beauty over the undulating
ground, that one scarcely can resist the idea that all those open spaces
in the woodland are the work of man. The eye involuntarily seeks for
farm-house and barn, while the sight of the red-haired guanaco makes the
scene all the more pastoral, for the wild beasts seem in that picture
very like domestic animals.

My own view of the picture was under peculiarly favorable circumstances,
for, although in the month of May, which corresponds to the November of
the North, the sun was bright and warm, the water sparkled, and a breeze
sweet and gentle just stirred the grass on the lawns and lifted the
green-leaved boughs of the trees. Seen on another day, when whirling
snow-laden squalls came down from the mountain to rip open the sea and
hurl its foam five hundred feet into the air, the picture would have had
a different aspect, but no landscape which contains green meadows and
green trees the year round can be called "desolate."

As to the meteorological condition among the islands the experience of
the missionaries there during twenty odd years has cleared away many
myths. Some of Captain Cook's men nearly froze to death in the land of
the Yahgans, but it is a fact that even the confined waters (salt) do
not freeze over often or remain frozen for any long time, while a
prolonged storm, during which the thermometer ranged from 10° to 15°
Fahrenheit, is mentioned in the missionary records as an unusually cold
spell. At the worst, the thermometer at Ushuaia has not gone lower than
12° below zero, Fahrenheit, and Ushuaia is about the coldest spot in the
region, because it stands under lofty, glazier-covered mountains that
shut out the rays of the sun for nineteen hours out of the twenty-four
during the short days of winter.

One white man at Ushuaia told me that it was a climate in which winter
and summer alternated every week, and that describes the matter fairly
well. That it is better than people elsewhere suppose may be inferred by
the fact that the white men now there, while admitting the frequent
recurrence of boisterous storms, invariably said it was "the healthiest
climate in the world," and a few said they liked it better than any
other.

Having considered the Yahgans' country and its climate, we now come to
their homes and home life. Of the Yahgans as architects and as tailors,
I am bound to say that they have been well described by the old-time
explorers. The hut was a structure made of poles and a thatch of brush
and grass that was of about the shape of a Yankee haycock, and only a
little larger. It was open on the lee side, the thatching, such as it
was, covering two thirds of the circumference to windward.

The fire was built just within the door or opening, and the inhabitants
sat on grass or moss that partly covered the earth floor. It was
sometimes customary, where the Indians expected to live for some time in
one place, to scoop out the earth of the bottom of the wigwam and heap
it up against the brush wall, thus making a saucer-shaped cavity for the
floor, the brim of which rose high enough to serve somewhat as a wind
break. Moreover, the limpet and other shells gathered by the squaws were
commonly piled to windward of the hut. But even then, if judged by any
white man's standard, the Yahgan house was as bad as any in the world.

So, too, of his dress. He wore a single guanaco or sealskin across his
shoulders, holding it in place by thongs that crossed his breast. This
was the best he wore. They were often stark naked, save for a breach
clout, and the children were always so. The traveller who visits Hermite
Island, in the immediate vicinity of Cape Horn, will find them so at
this day. Living thus, "shelterless and naked in a land of fierce and
freezing storms," one need not wonder that even scientific observers
believed the Yahgan "the most miserable specimen of humanity to be found
on earth."

And yet all who thought him either physically or mentally uncomfortable
when in his natural state were entirely wrong. On the contrary, he was
about the healthiest and happiest savage that ever smashed the head of
an egotistical, meddlesome white man.

The Yahgan was built for the climate where he was found. He was in one
respect like the whale that lived in the waters about him. He had a coat
of fat under his skin that was very much better for him than the best of
flannels and blankets. Besides, he had a custom that at once protected
him from the cold and rendered him offensive to his white discoverers.
He greased himself all over frequently with any oil at his command, and
that is a custom worth remembering by people who may be cast away or
lost in cold climates. Had the early explorers imitated instead of
despised the Yahgan, they would have had fewer tales of suffering to
tell. In these later years, sporting men of the United States have
learned that when about to enter long-distance swimming matches they can
endure the cooling effects of a race through the water much better if
they coat themselves thickly with some such grease as vaseline. The
Yahgan used whale oil as we use vaseline. The explorers spoke of his
"filthy greasy skin," but the scientific sporting man of New York now
imitates the Yahgan, even though vaseline gathers during a swim any
flotsam that comes handy by. The Yahgan was "shelterless and naked in a
land of fierce and freezing storms," but he did not freeze; he did not
even shiver in ordinary Cape Horn weather.

However, one can understand why the explorers did not perceive the real
condition of the Yahgan. They were cold in spite of thick flannels, and
it was but natural that they should judge others by themselves.

But one cannot so easily understand how the explorers fell into such
errors as they did about the ingenuity and the mechanical skill of the
native. The results of Yahgan handicraft were everywhere visible. He
could not make either a good house or a broadcloth suit. In his hands a
white man's coat was ripped to pieces and the strips used for
decorations. But there were his canoes and his weapons--especially his
canoes. The Yahgan boats are mentioned slightingly, if at all, by nearly
every traveller who has visited the region.

"The boats are unwieldy and logy, and the Indians seem to have no knack
of propelling them at any sort of speed," says a latter-day writer, who
saw a canoe of the kind in the Straits of Magellan. This was the
writer's judgment in the matter. But along with his judgment he gave
the dimensions of the boat. It was "about twenty-five feet long, four
feet wide, and three feet deep, with comparatively sharp ends." The
facts as I saw them are so, save that the ends seemed to me to be
extremely sharp.

Now let any civilized canoe expert imagine a boat of those proportions
with lines in an exact arc of a circle, and then let him say whether he
knows of any superior model among either civilized or savage nations--a
model better adapted for combined speed, safety, and capacity than this.
My own experience with Indian canoes includes the kayaks and oomiaks of
the Eskimos in Greenland, the dugouts of old Providence Island in the
Caribbean Sea, and the bongos of the Bay of Panama, but I am bound to
say that the most graceful canoe, as well as the strongest, I ever saw
was made by the Yahgan.

However, one fact about these canoes will convince any one who knows
what Cape Horn storms are that the Yahgan canoe is of a remarkable
model. The Yahgans used them in navigating the waters of the Cape Horn
Archipelago. Further than that, both the Rev. Thomas Bridges and the
Rev. John Lawrence, who for twenty years have been familiar with the
Yahgans, told me that they never heard of a Yahgan being upset in his
canoe until in these later years, when the possession of axes and the
teachings of the missionaries led the Indians to substitute dugouts of
an entirely different model for the canoes they had made in the old
days.

Judged only by his house and his clothing, the Yahgan was of a lower
grade of intelligence, or at least was worse off, than many brutes.
Judged by his canoe, he was a naval architect who produced a model to
which the designers of yachts in the United States and England are in
these days of "spoon" bows approaching, but have not yet equalled.

When the Yahgan would build a canoe he stripped wide pieces of bark from
the tallest and smoothest tree trunks he could find, using shell axes,
in the old days, to cut the trees. The bark was stripped from the trunk
with a wooden tool, something like a chisel, and of the very shape found
most advantageous by the white men who, in Pennsylvania and the
Adirondacks, supply hemlock bark to the tanneries. Having his bark off
the tree, the Yahgan cut the strips into such shape that when sewed
together they would form a canoe with a midship section, say four feet
wide by three deep, that was almost the arc of a circle. From this
section the model tapered away almost on the arc of another circle. It
had a sheer at once pleasing to the eye and well adapted to ride the
most tempestuous seas in the world.

To brace this bark sheathing the Yahgan made ribs of split saplings that
looked like hickory barrel hoops--ribs at once strong and light--while
the rails and beams were made of round wood. The bark strips were sewed
together with whalebone taken from whales stranded on the beach. The
ribs, rails, and beams were lashed in place by sinew, usually guanaco
sinew, for that curious animal is found on several islands of the Yahgan
region.

Into the bottom of this canoe the Yahgan put an inverted sod perhaps two
by three feet large, and on this his squaw built a small fire for
warmth. Forward and aft of the fire were put little layers of brush and
grass. The man squatted on the grass forward of the fire, and his
favorite squaw, if he had more than one, was just aft of it, the terms
forward and aft being used to indicate only the direction in which the
canoe travelled, for both ends were alike. The other squaws and the
children were distributed further from the fire. A squaw with an infant
would keep it in her lap. The squaws paddled, the men used the weapons.

But one may doubt whether the Yahgan canoe shows greater ingenuity than
Yahgan weapons and implements for obtaining food do. Mention has been
made of the shell axe. It was made of a five-inch clam shell, or one
larger. A rounded stone was lashed with sinew to the hinge side of the
shell to give weight and make a good hand hold. Then the opposite side
was ground to a cutting edge by rubbing away the softer inner or convex
surface on a smooth rock. Yahgan chips made with this tool were small,
but to see the rapidity with which an old Yahgan makes the blows, or
better still, to see the wavy surface of a strip of wood dressed with a
shell axe--a paddle, for instance--is a matter of interest almost worth
a journey to the region. With this tool the Yahgan felled trees, or
fashioned his harpoon, or stripped the blubber from a stranded whale, or
trimmed his o'er long bangs, as occasion required.

When compared with the stone axes used by aborigines who knew not iron,
this shell axe is a striking illustration of noteworthy differences
between the Yahgan and the other tribes. The shell axe was frail, but
keen-edged. It required a quick but delicate hand to manipulate it. The
stone axe was blunt and heavy. Impelled by a rude hand, it smashed its
way through whatever opposed its progress. With the shell axe in hand,
we begin to perceive somewhat of the mental habits and character of the
Yahgan Indian--to see, at least, that he preferred to accomplish
certain ends by delicate means rather than by sheer brute strength.

Then there were his harpoons. I have one of which the head, made from a
whale rib, is twenty-five and one quarter inches long. To make a diagram
of it let the reader place a dot on a sheet of paper to represent the
point, and then draw from this dot two straight lines that shall diverge
from each other only one inch and three quarters when twenty-one inches
long. That will give an idea of the beautiful taper of the weapon. It
has a single barb, at once deep and strong. It is secured to the shaft
in such a way that when a seal was struck the harpoon head dropped from
its place in the shaft, or handle, after which the handle was towed
broadside on through the water by the wounded beast. Of course, towing
the harpoon shaft in this fashion impeded the animal's flight more than
towing it end on would do.

Another harpoon that I have is twenty-one inches long, and but one inch
wide and a half inch thick at the base, but instead of one heavy barb
near the base it has a series of twenty-six small ones along one side.
These barbs hook back like shark's teeth, and are about as keen-pointed.
Nothing of better shape to hold fast could be devised by a fish-hook
maker. Indeed, the turtle hunters of the West Indies, who have a steel
harpoon of a similar shape, do not make as well-formed barbs. The
harpoon of one barb is for seals, otters, and small whales (large whales
were never attacked unless stranded), while the other form was for the
various kinds of birds found in the region.

For fish spears the Yahgan lashed two or three of the bird harpoon heads
to a shaft in such a manner that the points were spread out; the harpoon
heads formed a V or a tripod, as the case might be, and the barbs were
all on the inside. The fish were speared at night by the light of a
torch. By having two or more of the harpoon heads on the shaft the
chances of hitting the dimly seen fish were of course increased, and,
moreover, a fish caught between two of the harpoon heads and impaled by
a third, was held no matter how it struggled or what its strength.

Nor were the spear and harpoon handles merely saplings cut in the
forest. The Yahgan used a perfectly round handle for one harpoon and a
six-square handle for the other, and both were worked from solid wood
with his wonderful shell axe. I speak now, of course, of the original
native weapon, and not of what the modern Yahgan buys of white traders.

If any reader owns one of the old specimens of Indian workmanship let
him keep it with great care, for the workmen who could make them are
dead and their art is lost forever.

Less showy but equally remarkable were the peculiar wooden chisels with
which the squaws stripped limpets from rocks six feet under water and
brought them to the surface, although they were as heavy and as ready to
sink as stones.

For gathering shell-fish the squaws made baskets of rushes. These
baskets were of the shape of the plain earthen cooking jars found in the
old ruins and cave dwellings of New Mexico and Arizona.

For a long-range weapon the Yahgan used the sling. He saw the Ona
Indians with their bows and arrows. The Onas also used the bolas, which
are the favorite weapons of the Patagonian Indians. With the Ona Indians
the bow and the bolas were used with great success in killing the
fleet-footed guanaco. Now the Yahgan, as said, found the guanaco in his
own proper country as well as when he went visiting the Onas on the
borderland, and he must have fully appreciated all that the Onas could
do with their bolas and bows. Some of the Yahgans even learned to use
these Ona weapons, but they never adopted them. The reason is not far to
seek. The Yahgan sling had a much greater range. The missionaries tell
about Yahgans killing birds afloat at a distance of two hundred yards.
To hit any wild fowl at that distance with a rifle would be called right
good shooting. The guanaco was knocked down and stunned by heavy round
pebbles at ranges up to one hundred yards.

Why, then, did not the Ona adopt the sling? The answer is an interesting
one for the student of anthropology. The home of the Ona was on the
prairies of Tierra del Fuego, where round pebbles are not to be found,
but material for bows and arrows is abundant. The Ona could not burden
himself with pebbles for a sling when journeying across these prairies.
On the other hand, the Yahgan lived on the beaches, where rounded
pebbles were forever at hand, and when he travelled it was not afoot, as
the Ona did, but in a first-class canoe, where he could carry as many
pebbles as he wanted.

The Yahgan sling was made of a piece of raw hide, to which were attached
strings of braided sinew that always ended in fancifully wrought knots.

The Yahgans did not fish with hooks, because they could catch more fish
without. The squaws caught the fish. They paddled to the fishing ground
in the morning and at night, when for an hour each time, the light
being just right, the fish would bite. The line was a strand of seaweed,
which may be had there, slender and strong, of any length up to a
hundred fathoms, perhaps. Bait--meat--was tied to one end of the line,
which was loaded with a sinker of stone rounded to a shape to sink
swiftly. The fish swallowed the bait and the squaw drew it gently but
quickly to the surface. Then she snatched the fish into the boat and the
bait from its gullet with a motion that Georges Bank codfishermen
understand, and then let her bait run quickly down again. Some fish, too
large to land thus, were speared when they came in sight. The time for
fishing was so short that the squaws had to improve it to the utmost
advantage, especially as there were many days when the storms prevented
all fishing. They had no time to waste in removing hooks from the
gullets of fish. It is a fact that when hooks were given them by seamen
they never used the things for fishing. The Yahgan squaws did not know
the joys of taking four-pound trout with a seven-ounce rod, but they had
just as much fun as do the New Yorkers who go out to the fishing banks
every summer day, and they caught more fish, too.

The Yahgan household utensils were few in number and of the simplest
character. He made neither pots, nor kettles, nor cups, nor basins, nor
any sort of receptacle for liquids. He never boiled his food, and when
the missionaries came to the Yahgan land the Indians found the spectacle
of a pot full of boiling meat a most entertaining one. And yet the
Yahgans tried out the oil from whale blubber and other fats, and stored
it away for future use. The fat was impaled on a stick that was then
thrust into the ground close to a bed of coals. The oil was tried out
thus, and it dripped down into the shoulder blade of a guanaco kept for
the purpose. When the hollow of this bone was full, the oil was poured
into a bladder or into the bladder-like leaf of a seaweed that can be
found everywhere in the region. Moreover, there were large clam and
other sea shells on every beach. These served every need of the Yahgan
in the way of cups and basins. What he needed to make he made with
unusual neatness and skill, but he knew when he had enough and worked
for nothing whatever beyond.

If, now, it has been demonstrated that the early explorers looked at the
Yahgan products through prejudiced eyes, the reader will pass with
increasing pleasure to a consideration of the habits of thought and
mental capacity of this Antarctic highlander. I quote Darwin in this
matter, because he was the most eminent of all who have seen the
Yahgans, and should have been less liable than others to make errors.

Darwin had on his ship a Yahgan called Jemmy Button, who had been
carried to England and taught some of the English language. Of this
Yahgan Darwin said: "I should think there was scarcely another human
being with so small a stock of language."

The Rev. Thomas Bridges, who now lives opposite Gable Island, in the
Beagle Channel, has for nearly forty years made a study of the Yahgans
and their language. He has made out of this study a complete grammar of
their language, and has written what is practically a complete
Yahgan-English lexicon. Fully to appreciate the facts that appear in
these two manuscript books, one must not only be something of a
linguist, but must have knowledge of other aboriginal tribes. For
instance, it is helpful to know that Ensign Roger Wells, Jr., U. S.
Navy, working in Alaska, prepared an Anglo-Eskimo Vocabulary of 2263
words, and an Eskimo-English Vocabulary of 2418 words. To quote from a
pamphlet issued by the Alaskan Bureau of Education in 1890, _Circular of
Information No. 2_, the most important contribution to a knowledge of
the Eskimo language is in process of preparation by L. M. Turner, in his
observations made in 1882-84, at Point Barrow. "It will contain a
vocabulary of the Koksoagmyut of over 7000 words."

Cruden's _Concordance of the Bible_ gives 7200 words exclusive of proper
names; Cleveland's _Concordance to the Poems of Milton_ gives Milton's
Vocabulary as 17,377 words, while Shakespeare himself had a vocabulary
of about 24,000.

But the Yahgans, despised by many as "savages of the lowest grade,"
pitied by a few as "most abject and miserable creatures"--these Yahgans
had a language from which has been compiled a vocabulary of over 40,000
words.

As I have said, this is a story in part of one of the most interesting
American tribes. How small is the proportion of the story that I can
give may be inferred from what has just been said about their language.
Where did they get or develop all those words? Are those 40,000 words
the remains of a language which, under other circumstances, was greater,
or is the vocabulary now at its greatest state of perfection? How does
it happen that such a remarkable mental development was found in a
people that lived as these Yahgans did? Questions multiply, but no
answers are found.

Anthropologists suppose that the peoples living at the ends of the earth
under adverse circumstances are "conquered races, exiles, or criminals."
It is guessed by some who have read of the Yahgan that he comes from
some ancient Peruvian or Brazilian civilized tribe, and fled in war time
to Cape Horn. But the Yahgan language is not that of Peru or of Brazil,
or even that of the lost tribes of Israel. There is in it nothing to
connect it with any of the other great languages of the world. Why,
then, should we think incredible the possibility of the Yahgans having
originated where they are? In the alluvial beds of Patagonia and of
Tierra del Fuego are found the petrified remains of the opossum, the
kangaroo, and the monkey. The ostrich and a modified camel (the
guanaco), now live on the desert plains of Patagonia. Who, then, shall
say positively that the Yahgan race has not lived through the cataclysms
that destroyed the opossum and the monkey and left the ostrich and the
camel?

Some years ago the Chili Government sent an expedition to explore the
Yahgan country. The report made by the commander on his return refers to
the Yahgan language as "nasal and harsh; it sounds like the barking of a
dog," but all who speak the language agree that it is as soft and sweet
to the ear as a love-song in French.

To make a study of the construction of this language here would be
impossible for lack of space, even if I knew the facts, but something of
the way the Yahgans talked to one another will be interesting, because
it gives an insight into their character. Let it be remembered that this
was a tribe of so-called savages, and that among savages the squaw is
supposed to be a wretched slave. To the casual observer the Yahgan squaw
was a slave. She paddled the canoe "while the man sat in the bow holding
his weapons." But the Yahgan squaw's life was certainly not without its
amenities, if one may judge by the language.

Thus the Yahgan man never spoke to his squaw of any property in the
family as "mine." He said "ours" instead. He even said "our harpoon." He
never gave orders directly to either squaw or child. If he wanted
something done he would use an expression that meant "Tell to do"; it
was as if he said to his squaw, "Have some one do so and so." More
remarkable still, there was no such word in the language as "obey." They
said instead, "Oblige me by," "Make me the favor of," "Would you be
pleased or be so kind as to do this or that?" Even when the Yahgan was
angry and wished to drive away an offensive person he used a polite
sentence.

As among civilized people certain terms and names may be used between
man and wife, or when talking to a physician or between two men talking
alone, without incurring an accusation of using indecent language, so
among the Yahgans there were certain forms of expression for use in
private and others for society. In short, it was a modest race; in this
respect it was, perhaps, the most remarkable of all the American Indian
nations.

They had poets and novelists and historians. They knew, for instance,
how to tell in the most delicate fashion those sly stories in which the
point was found in the thought of the listeners, and not in the words of
the speaker--where the speaker's words suggested but did not say the
thought. No people in the world enjoyed well-told stories of the kind
more than they, but only the skilful--the literati--were permitted to
tell them. A gross expression was never permitted in company. It is a
lasting pity that none of these tales has been preserved for study. The
missionary taught the Yahgans that their soul's salvation was imperilled
by such thoughts, and the remnant of the race has become so degraded in
every way that the best of this wonderful oral literature has been lost.

They had songs, but no music as civilized people understand that word.
Their songs were what travellers call "monotonous chants." However, they
danced to some songs, and their words were poetic if the song did lack
jingle and varied intonations.

"Food was abundant in the old days," said the Rev. Thomas Bridges, "and
life was easy with them." Hence the Yahgans had abundant leisure to sit
about the hut fire and talk to one another. Their conversation is best
described by the word bright. They were as quick-witted--as quick and
brilliant at repartee as the Irish or French. They also made many puns.
They were what may be called a "clubable race," to borrow a Johnsonian
expression. The missionaries say that within their limits of knowledge
they were ready and logical thinkers. Sarcastic remarks and cynical
observations abounded in their fireside conversations, as well as
flashes of kindly humor.

In politics and religion they were almost equally interesting. They had
no form of government--neither chief nor legislative council--but public
opinion ruled with an iron hand. Theirs was the simplest form of a
republic. When men violated social usages, as sometimes happened, the
guilty were ostracized, and such was the habit of thought among them
that this ostracism drove the guilty one away to live by himself.
Occasionally several families were thus driven into exile together, but
I did not learn of the existence of any such colonies of outlaws as
that found below St. Lawrence Bay on the Siberian coast or the
Kevalinyes, whose home is back of Point Hope in Alaska.

Crimes against property were rare. As to the property of white men they
were called thieves and robbers. Fitzroy is particularly severe on them
in describing their lax notions about property. It seems to me, however,
that the Yahgans and all aboriginal tribes, for that matter, have been
unjustly condemned in this matter. That they took things that seemed of
infinite value to them, which did not belong to them, is not denied. But
this act was not morally what the same act on the part of a civilized
man would have been. Among the aborigines--especially among the
Yahgans--there was much property held in common. It was no harm among
them to take of a neighbor's fuel; his paints were freely divided; his
wood for use in making paddles or spear-shafts was practically common
property. All food taken was equally divided, and when chance threw a
prize, say a wrecked ship, in their way, all shared the valuables found.
So when they saw among white men a superabundance of good things, the
taking of what they saw did not seem the evil thing that it would have
been to the conscience of a white thief. They were, in short, socialists
rather than thieves.

Crimes against the person were avenged by the injured one or his
relatives, so that feuds and vendettas led families to hunting each
other, hither and yon, across stormy seas and into wild and secluded
nooks and inlets. But the Yahgan did not delight in open warfare or
bloodshed. Warfare with neighboring tribes was almost unknown. The
nearest approach to it was when some Yahgan family went hunting some
family of a neighboring tribe to avenge an injury suffered by some
member of the aggressive family. On rare occasions other families in
both tribes took up the quarrel.

The Yahgan could work himself into a foaming passion--he literally
frothed at the mouth in his rage--but he preferred to make even murder a
fine art. He would plan and scheme for months in order that he might
revenge himself without making an open attack. It is said that even the
strong and influential in a clan would work in this fashion when seeking
revenge on the weaker ones, who might have been crushed by a blow at any
moment.

A favorite way of killing an enemy was found in the practice of
gathering the eggs of the sea fowl. In the Cape Horn region the sea fowl
make their nests on the faces of precipices that literally overhang the
stormy seas. There is but one way to reach the nests. The egg gatherer
must be lowered by a rope from the brow of the cliff. The Yahgans had an
excellent rope in the long stalks of seaweed common in the region, and
the egg harvest was for most of them a time of rejoicing. It was also
the time for bloody revenges. The one who sought revenge would ask his
enemy to go seeking eggs, and that was an invitation not to be declined.
Even when the invited one suspected a sinister motive in the cordiality
of the request he must needs accept, because a refusal would be
construed by his neighbors into an acknowledgment that the other had
cause for seeking revenge. And such an acknowledgment would justify the
other in more open means of revenge, and would stamp the refuser as a
coward also.

So the invited one would smilingly accept the invitation. With his heart
sinking within him, he would follow the leader to the crest of the
awful precipice, look down five hundred feet to the crags at its foot,
and then without a word suffer himself to be lowered over the brow at
the end of a rope that he knew would soon be chafed until his weight
would break it.

These Yahgans had no knowledge of God or of a life to come. That they
should have faced certain death in a frightful form thus calmly when
they were young, and life was still sweet, and a loved wife and children
would be left to other hands, is one of their most interesting
characteristics.

Although about all the crimes known to Yahgans grew out of the relations
of the sexes--although there was almost invariably a woman in every
case--it is a fact that the grossest crimes of passion known to
civilized races (such as incest) were unknown among Yahgans.

Marriage was a matter of purchase and sale; wives were sold, sometimes,
by husbands, and daughters were invariably sold by fathers. The marriage
ceremony consisted in painting the girl in a certain fashion for several
days before she was delivered to her husband. A new canoe was very often
the price of a girl. It is a curious fact, illustrative of Yahgan
society, that a father sometimes sold his girls to men whom he did not
really like. A man of influence could have any girl he wished; her
father would rather let the transfer be made than offend the man of
influence, and that, too, when the influential fellow already had a wife
or two. But there were forms and methods in the marriage negotiations
that were dear to the Yahgan heart. The dicker for a wife as conducted
amounted to what would be among civilized people at once an intrigue and
the negotiating of a treaty. It was because of this delicacy of feeling
among the Yahgans that the brutal white whalers and seal hunters that
came to the region were unable to do any serious damage to this race
previous to the year 1870. The Yahgan would not tolerate the rude
lasciviousness of the white seamen, and until taught that it was wicked,
stood up, man fashion, and fought in defence of his wives and daughters.

In religion the Yahgans were oddities, though not unique. They knew
nothing of God, and had no word expressive of such an idea. To the great
grief of the missionaries, there was nothing in the Yahgan language by
which the idea of an everlasting, all-powerful God who must be obeyed
could be adequately conveyed to Yahgan listeners, nor had they any word
for or thought of a future life.

But the Yahgan's mind was not wholly material. He believed in spirits or
supernatural and invisible beings, but these were invariably terrible.
There was a spirit of the forest, and another of the water, and another
of the kelp. Crouching over his tiny fire by night, the Yahgan heard
weird voices among the waving trees on the mountain side above him, he
felt the breath that scattered the embers of his hearth, he saw the
deluge that drowned out even his brightest flames, and all these were
manifestations of a power that was ill-defined in his mind, but
nevertheless real. The Yahgan mother in this fearsome presence clasped
her babe more closely to her bosom, not that it was cold, but to save it
from some grasping hand that was always expected, but never came.

In the eddying waters of the tide rip was a boisterous devil that strove
at one moment to throw the canoe into the air, and the next to suck it
down to the unknown region below, while in the beds of kelp lurked a
silent spirit that with soft and slimy touch grasped the bottom of the
canoe, and held it fast until at times the frantic occupants leaped
overboard and disappeared.

In their thoughts of death the Yahgans were perhaps unique. They had a
word which meant dead. When a seal had been harpooned, or a tree cut
down, or a fish beheaded, they said that death ensued. The thing killed
was dead. They had another word which meant lost. If a tool were mislaid
so that it could not be found, or if a dog were left somewhere on the
coast so that he could not find his way to his master's hut, the tool or
the dog was lost.

In times of sickness or of wounds, the Yahgans gathered about an
afflicted one and with rude incantations strove to save the ebbing life
until the spirit had gone forever. Then they quickly took up the body,
and, carrying it out of the wigwam, buried it where it could be most
easily put out of sight. This done, they returned and painted their
faces in such fashion that all other Yahgans who beheld them could tell
how closely the dead one had been related to the living, and the cause
of the death--whether by disease, by accident, or by murder. This was
their only way of showing they were in mourning. They rarely spoke of
the one who had passed away, and when they did so speak they never said
he was dead. They said he was lost.

This also was a matter of grief to the missionaries. When they would
have spoken to the Yahgan of his dead relatives they could not without
offending him seriously; at least that was the condition of affairs when
the missionaries first came.

They had a folk-lore that is now for the most part forgotten, but one
of their traditions was at the foundation of a cruel custom. Long ago,
they said, a Yahgan woman chose a great rock instead of a husband, and,
in consequence, bore a child that was at once a human being and a stone.
When this hybrid grew to man's estate it turned against the tribe,
because, perhaps, of indignities suffered by its mother, who was
ostracized. No Yahgan man could stand against it, though numbers could
temporarily overpower it. They, therefore, combined and thrust harpoons
through it; they chopped it to pieces; they weighted it with rocks and
cast it into a lake; but after each apparent death it appeared again in
another part of the coast as healthy as and rather more malicious than
before. The monster was rapidly becoming an invincible terror, when, by
chance, it stepped on a thorn, which pierced its heel and the monster
was unable to extract it. Its heel was the one part of its body where a
mortal wound could be inflicted. From the effects of this thorn it
became gradually weakened, and they were eventually able to destroy it
altogether. The memory of the deeds done by this being was so
terrifying, that the tribe determined that no such thing should ever
come again to wreck their peace.

To prevent such a coming they invariably destroyed at birth any infant
that came into the world not perfectly formed. The Yahgan's stature was
not such as to meet the approval of the British explorers from whom
Americans have obtained their ideas of Yahgan forms, but there never was
a natural-born cripple to be seen among them.

What the Yahgans' claims to physical beauty were may still be learned by
one who sees them at the Hermite group of islands, but in the Beagle
Channel they have been so altered by new clothing and habits of life
that scarcely a trace of their old-time form remains. The description of
the old-time navigator is not attractive:

     These poor wretches were stunted in their growth, their hideous
     faces bedaubed with paint, their skins filthy and greasy, their
     hair entangled.

They are elsewhere spoken of as having dark, copper-colored skins, or
skins of the color of iron rust, while Captain Fitzroy pictures them as
almost black.

One may admit that these old explorers had good eyes, that they
generally described with accuracy what they saw, and yet may prove that
the Yahgans were not hideous.

To begin the argument, it must be said that the missionaries, who had no
interest in making the untutored Yahgan appear in a better light than
that in which he was found, say that he was a polite and affectionate
husband and father, faithful in the care of widows and orphans, a
generous neighbor, and an ardent lover. Food was abundant, and hard
labor rarely necessary. He delighted in what civilized people call the
higher pleasures, the joys of good stories, witty sayings, quick
repartee, and he had almost unlimited opportunity for cultivating the
faculties which gave him greatest pleasure. How could such a man be
hideous?

The answer to the allegation made by the explorers who called the Yahgan
so is not far to seek. They never saw the Yahgan. They only saw the
coating of paint and whale oil that covered him, and because this was
offensive to them they called him hideous. The Yahgan when washed clean,
did not look like the Yahgan clothed in whale oil, smoke from the
ever-present fire, ashes, powdered iron ore, pipe clay--what not. When
washed he was not black; he was not even copper colored. He was as white
as the quarter bloods one sees in the Cherokee nation and as well
featured. The young women were very like those of mixed blood who grace
the halls of the female seminary at Tahlequa, the Cherokee capitol. The
modern tourist camera proves it. Yahgans had straight black hair, great
dark eyes, full red lips, breasts like a Greek Venus, rounded limbs, and
small hands and feet. Better yet, they had a merry, hearty laugh that
was irresistibly infectious. They flushed with pleasure, and blushed and
drooped as if from a blow when shamed.

If ever the moans of outraged Indian maidenhood were charged up by the
Recording Angel against the brutality of the civilized man, it was when
the sufficient arm that protected the Yahgan girl was withdrawn through
a misapplication of the gospel of peace.

Just how the Yahgan maiden lost that protecting arm--just how it
happened that the forecastle brutes came to be free to go and come as
they pleased among the Yahgan homes--will be told in the next chapter,
but what that arm was is found in the tales of seamen cast on these
shores in the old days, or caught napping there when seeking fuel or
water for their ships.

When a band of Yahgans saw a crew of white men ashore in former times,
their course of action was governed entirely by the numbers of the
whites, or, rather, by the comparative strength of the two parties. If
the whites were stronger, the Indians were peaceable; when it was safe
to do so, the Indians set out to exterminate all the whites but one.
Leaping into their canoes some of the Indians would paddle out to cut
off retreat toward the sea, and when they were in place, the rest would
rush down on the seamen, and if possible save all alive for the time
being. Then all the clan gathered about the captives and selected one of
the whites--saved him alive, but forced him to witness the dying
struggles of the rest. Very often those doomed to death were made to
stand in a row facing the one that was saved, that he might the better
witness their despairing faces and see the blood gush from their wounds.
Eventually the one who was saved was taken to the Straits of Magellan,
and there placed on board the first ship that appeared. It was perfectly
plain that a man from each crew was thus sent back to the whites that he
might tell other whites of the fate that befell all foreigners who
landed in Yahgan land. They wanted the whites to keep away from them,
and they took a most effectual means to keep them away. With certain
death staring in the face, any crew that was outnumbered by the natives,
even the sealers, took care to avoid going among the Yahgans. The
Yahgan's deliberate ferocity--ferocity that was exercised with a
purpose--was the sufficient protection of the Yahgan maidens.

As has been said, the Yahgans had an abundance of food in the old days.
The cold waters about Cape Horn swarmed with whales. So numerous were
the fur seals that one sealing schooner got a "first knock down" on one
island of 11,000 head. The hair seal, the otter, and the sea lion were
found by the thousand. Swans, geese, ducks, penguins, gulls, beat the
air and ploughed the waters in uncounted hosts. There were fish in the
sea and guanacos on the land. For a vegetable food there was "a bright
yellow fungus," "elastic and turgid," that had "a mucillaginous,
slightly sweet taste, with a faint smell like that of a mushroom." There
were wild currants and strawberries that tasted more like a raspberry
than like its northern namesake. There was a berry that grew on a thorny
bush (berberis). But the mainstay of the Yahgan was the shell-fish.
Mussels and clams covered every rock under water, and these were alone
sufficient in number and in food qualities to preserve life for long
periods.

The explorers say the Yahgans ate guanaco meat raw. The Rev. Thomas
Bridges denies this. He says, in a lecture on the Yahgans, prepared for
delivery before white folks:

     They toasted whale or seal blubber on pointed sticks stuck in the
     ground, and caught the oil in large mussel shells placed
     underneath. As these filled they poured the oil into bladders for
     future use. They dried out fish fat by putting it in large shells
     and placing heated stones or shells on it. They cooked large birds
     whole by burying them in the coals with hot stones placed inside.
     They baked eggs by placing them, after a small hole had been made
     in each shell, on end close to the embers and turning them from
     time to time. They uniformly ate the blood of animals, but always
     cooked it in shells first. I have never seen or heard of the
     Yahgans eating any kind of meat or fish raw except certain kinds of
     limpets. I have occasionally heard of their heating water by
     dropping hot stones into it, but they did not cook their vegetable
     food. In winter, however, they warmed the frozen fungi that formed
     a part of their diet.

A thousand other interesting facts and characteristics of this
long-despised tribe remain untold here.

There was their habit of carrying dry bird's down to catch the spark
when they struck fire with the iron ore they found on one island only.

They had a tradition that in by-gone years a great flood raised the
waters to the level of certain lines on the mountains, to which they
point the traveller.

They were sensitive about growing old, and it was because their beard
grew late in life and so indicated advancing years that the men plucked
it out.

They were a long-lived race, and some probably lived to be a hundred in
the old days.

They were not cannibals, but held human life as sacred as civilized
people do. It is admitted that in times of dire distress, through
prolonged storms, they sacrificed one (an old woman) to save the rest,
but if that made them cannibals then an American army officer held in
high esteem is a cannibal.

When food was scarce those who got it divided all they had with those
less fortunate, and while hunting away from the huts the men subsisted
on the inferior parts, that they might carry the parts most esteemed to
the women and children.

They did not beat their wives, nor did they punish their children.

To sum the matter up, this was a race, more than three thousand in
number, called the most abject and wretched people in the world, and
yet, "in their circumstances and with their materials, their work was
perfect." They were called savages, and yet neither governor nor judge
was needed to preserve the prosperity of the nation. They were called
heathen, because they knew not God; and yet, prompted by an inner light,
they took no thought for the morrow, they visited the widow and the
orphan in their affliction; neither was there any among them that
lacked. Clear-eyed and strong-limbed, they were able, twenty years ago,
to face the white destroyer as they faced the howling gales that swept
their rugged coasts.

Today the traveller can find, though he search diligently, rather less
than three hundred, but to one who knew them in the old days those seen
anywhere now, save on Hermite Island, would not be recognizable. The
Rev. John Lawrence told me that they were civilized, but to one who can
understand and appreciate the aborigines as God made them, this change,
instead of being a matter of congratulation, is one that should make
every white man connected with it hide his head in shame, and every
other one who sees it shed tears of pity.




CHAPTER IV.

A CAPE HORN MISSION.


The reader who has at hand a good modern map of South America will find,
on looking along the narrow channel that bounds the south side of Tierra
del Fuego, a tiny settlement named Ushuaia. On some maps the settlement
is located on Navarin Island, south of the channel, but the proper place
for it is on a small bay that indents Tierra del Fuego, just east of the
line between Chili and Argentine territory. The settlement is, in fact,
an Argentine capital, the seat of the Government of the Argentine
belongings lying south of the Straits of Magellan. Ushuaia, as a white
man's capital, will be described at another time. In its earliest days
the settlement was a missionary station, containing only a single log
hut, the home of the first Christian who succeeded in gaining a foothold
among the Indians of the Cape Horn region, and it is my purpose here to
tell, as briefly as possible, the true story of this Cape Horn mission.

Something has already been told about the characteristics of the
remarkable people, the Yahgans, who were indigenous to the region--of
their apparent squalid wretchedness when, in fact, they were actually
comfortable and living in the enjoyment of some of the highest pleasures
known to civilized peoples. It is, therefore, necessary for the reader
to shut out from his mind about all the real facts concerning them, and
think only of what they seemed to be if he would fully appreciate the
spirit and intent of the founders of the mission to the Yahgans. It must
be remembered that the region was supposed to be bleak and desolate,
that frightful storms followed each other in swift succession, that the
cold was often intense in midsummer, and that in the midst of these
terrors of nature lived a tribe of savages so low in the human scale
that they did not know enough to build houses to shelter them, or even
to sew skins together into a decent blanket for a covering.

People who had read the journals of the explorers of the region
shuddered at the thought of the life of misery which the natives there
were said to endure. Indeed, so dark was the picture of human life
there, that, although men had been found to brave death at the stake in
the valley of the Mohawk, none so much as suggested in the early days a
mission to the Yahgans, save only as Sarmiento's ill-fated colony hoped
to convert the heathen as well as hold the Straits of Magellan for the
crown of Spain. Nevertheless, a time came when the very terrors of
nature and the apparent degradation of the people there were the magnets
to draw one man to them. This man came from a race and a profession "to
whom an appeal for volunteers for a forlorn hope was never made in
vain." The first missionary to the Fuegian Indians came from the British
Navy.

Captain Allen Francis Gardiner, R.N., was born on June 28, 1794, at
Basilden, Berks, England. He entered the Royal Navy in June, 1810, and
was rapidly promoted until he attained the rank of captain. He was from
his youth an ardent Christian--so ardent, indeed, that he determined to
devote his life to mission work, and only remained in the navy because
he wished to learn what people of the earth was most neglected and
forlorn--most in need of the Christian religion. Having caught a few
glimpses of the Yahgans and their people, and having read the stories
about them which Captain Fitzroy and Naturalist Darwin, with many
others, wrote, Captain Gardiner naturally concluded that the Cape Horn
archipelago was his field. Accordingly, he began work by organizing, in
1814, a mission society, after which he made an attempt to live in his
chosen field.

"He and several devoted companions were landed on one of the small
islands with a tent, materials for a wooden house, and stores and
provisions to last six months," says the record. "But in a very few days
the conduct of the natives showed the missionaries that to remain on
land was impossible. Mercifully the vessel which had brought them was
still within hail," and they were taken off and borne to England.

The trouble with the Indians, it appears, was that they looked with
covetous eyes on the outfit of the missionaries. The record says they
were robbers, but it now appears that this term is much too harsh. They
did, indeed, strive to take valuables from the missionaries without
making any return whatever for them, but it must not be forgotten that
the Yahgans held practically all property in common. They naturally
resented what seemed to them to be the selfishness of these white
intruders just as they ostracized one of their own tribe who did
anything contrary to Yahgan custom.

Finding, as he supposed, his life in danger when he tried to make a home
among the Yahgans, Captain Gardiner returned home to try to raise money
for a ship in which he could live in a Yahgan harbor. He believed he
could repel any Yahgan boarders that might attack him, and eventually
make friends with the repulsed. But he failed to get the money, because
the English were skeptical as to the success of even a mission ship.

Thereat the determined captain bought instead two launches twenty-six
feet long and decked them over. The sum of £1000 was deemed necessary
for this enterprise, of which "a generous Christian lady of Cheltenham
gave £700." Gardiner himself gave £300.

"Captain Gardiner, with three Cornish sailors, Christian men accustomed
to stormy seas," "the ship carpenter who had gone with Captain Gardiner
before," "two men as catechists, Mr. Maidment, and Mr. Richard Williams,
the latter a surgeon in good practice,"--these seven sailed from
Liverpool on September 7, 1850, in the ship _Ocean Queen_, which was
bound to the booming town of San Francisco, but agreed to land them and
their outfit in Tierra del Fuego. They carried stores for six months,
and arranged for more to come before these should be exhausted. On
December 5th their ship anchored in a bay called Banner Cove, in the
west end of Picton Island. The missionaries landed, and then natives
came. Fearing violence the missionaries took refuge on the _Ocean Queen_
for a few days, and then, on December 18th, landed again, built a wigwam
near the beach, moored their boats handy by, and let the big ship sail
away.

Then came what the record calls "a terrible discovery." In taking their
outfit from the _Ocean Queen_ the missionaries had left on board about
all the powder and lead with which to kill the Indians. "They were now
alike without the means of self-defence and of obtaining food," is the
way the story of Captain Gardiner's life puts it, but the plain English
of the matter is that they had come relying on guns to protect them.
They meant to shoot the Indians under certain circumstances. Their motto
was, so to speak: "Trust in God, but keep your powder dry." Now,
however, they had no powder and "they were left almost wholly dependent
on meal, rice, and such things."

Thereafter they "went beating about among the islands, alarmed by every
indication of the people for whose sake all this misery was
encountered." In a diary, written by one of the party, one may read that
"I applied the golden key to heaven's treasury, and with it opened the
storehouse of God's exceeding great and precious promises. What I saw
and felt of Christ's love no tongue can tell," but their faith in Divine
protection was not strong enough to make them risk a visit to the
Indians, and so, at last, they actually died of starvation, although the
region produced and produces a prodigious supply of mussels and limpets,
wild celery and other edible vegetables, not to mention fish and mammals
easily snared by one not afraid to venture away from his boat.

"It does seem remarkable that Gardiner should have apparently erred from
timidity and over-caution," says the writer of the life of that
missionary, and then he piously adds: "We must look to the will of God
in the whole affair."

The death of Gardiner through his own cowardice, to put the matter
bluntly, is only one--the first of a long list of doings that "seem
remarkable" in this story.

The Gardiner party sailed from Liverpool on September 7, 1850. The last
entry in the diary of Captain Gardiner is dated September 5, 1851, while
a letter was found dated the day following. Gardiner, who was the last
survivor, probably died one year from the time he sailed. In October
came the relief ship to the port in Picton Island. An inscription on a
rock which the traveller can still see there was found. It was as
follows:

        Dig Below.
      Go to Spaniard
         Harbour
          March
           1851

Spaniard Harbor is now called Aguirre Bay. A gale of wind prevented the
relief ship going there, but Her Majesty's ship _Dido_ was sent out, and
she recovered the papers of the dead missionaries and buried the human
bones. Her colors were lowered and three volleys were fired by the
marines after the funeral, because Gardiner had been a naval captain;
and all this, having been well told, together with the stories found in
the diaries, made a sensation in England.

To one who knows the region, the appeals thereafter made by the
missionary society to the English-speaking world seem very remarkable.
Though I do not doubt the honest intentions of the society people, some
of their words would seem to be deliberate attempts to deceive, if
coming from any other kind of society. Thus in _A Memoir of Richard
Williams_, by James Hamilton, D.D., is an appeal for funds for the
society, which (p. 255) says:

     This agency may soon stud with gardens and farms and industrious
     villages these inhospitable shores. The mariner may run his
     battered ship into Lennox Harbour and leave her to the care of
     Fuegian caulkers and carpenters; and after rambling through the
     streets of a thriving seaport town, he may turn aside to read the
     papers in the Gardiner Institution, or may step into the
     week-evening service in the Richard Williams chapel.

Following the advice contained in papers which Captain Gardner left, and
taking advantage of the emotions raised among church people by the story
of the Captain's death, the society raised funds with which they built
and manned a schooner fit for the stormiest sea, and sent it out to
establish a station for the conversion of the Yahgans. She was commanded
by Captain W. Parker Snow, and she carried Mr. Garland Phillips, as
catechist, to Keppel Island, one of the Falklands then uninhabited. They
arrived out on January 28, 1855, and found the island about eight miles
long and four wide, with three fresh water lakes. It was "a barren,
desolate place," Phillips thought, and according to the record he and
his associates lived there for more than two years before they got a
single Yahgan to come to live with them.

Eventually "a strong party" was sent out from England to re-enforce
Phillips and "push the work vigorously." This party included "Tom
Bridges, a good-looking, affectionate boy of fourteen, who loved
everybody, and whom everybody loved," and this is the earliest mention
of one who has since made himself the most noted of all who have worked
in the mission. Thereafter matters went on better, because the "strong
party" made a right good sheep ranch of Keppel Island, and in 1857 got
the Yahgan named Button, his wife, and his children to go to Keppel.

With Button as interpreter, Phillips and some others went over to
Navarin Island in November, 1858, and built a log-house there, in which
they remained a month with the natives about them, returning the first
of 1859 with nine natives, whom they proposed instructing on the ranch
at Keppel Island. These instructions continued until the following
October, when Phillips took them back in his schooner, which was manned
by a captain, a mate, four seamen, a carpenter, and a cook, all
"decidedly good men." On the way over (it was a voyage of six days),
Phillips missed some valuables, and after accusing the Yahgans of
stealing, searched their bundles. Of course the Yahgans were highly
offended, but their anger was apparently appeased later, and a landing
was affected on Navarin Island in peace.

But on the following Sunday, when all hands except the cook went ashore
to hold church services, the Yahgans arose and killed the entire party
that came to them. The cook escaped to the brush when the natives came
after him, and there remained until hunger drove him out. The natives
then bound him, stripped off his clothes, but gave him their own
favorite article of clothing instead--a coat of whale oil, and with no
other dress than whale oil this cook lived in perfect health, until he
was rescued some three months later by a ship that came from the
Falklands in search of the schooner.

This deadly assault on the missionaries is frequently referred to in the
missionary publications to show how fierce and degraded the Yahgans were
before the missionaries got a foothold among them.

During the three years that followed only two Yahgans, a man and his
wife, lived on Keppel Island, but the young English boy spoken of--Tom
Bridges--proved a natural linguist, and so rapidly learned their
language from the Yahgans, that at the end of three years he could talk
freely with them.

Then came a new man into the field, the Rev. W. H. Stirling, who now
lives in Buenos Ayres, and is the Bishop of the Church of England for
South America. On the arrival of Stirling "the interrupted work was
resumed with vigor," and "forty or fifty Fuegians were brought at
intervals" to Keppel.

Of the life led by the Yahgans and the missionaries on Keppel Island,
the records speak freely, and it is worth while considering what that
life was, because Keppel was the preparatory school of the mission.

It appears by direct statement that the missionaries believed "our hope
for the material improvement of these natives lies in their adopting and
following farming and agricultural pursuits with fishing." We must
believe that the first object that the missionaries had in view in
taking the Yahgans to Keppel was to teach them the Christian religion,
because the missionaries say so; but it is apparent that "material"
matters were never lost sight of. The records give the length of time
devoted to these "material" matters every day, as well as that given to
mental and spiritual pursuits. Up to 1879 the natives had two hours per
day for instructions, but in October of that year the school hours were
increased to three per day. The rest of the day was devoted to work on
the sheep ranch and to the garden where the missionaries raised
vegetables. But not all of the Yahgans there received even two hours'
instruction per day, for a missionary who sent two to Keppel from
Wollaston Island wrote regarding them, that they "will, I have no doubt,
make very good men on the farm, but I do not think they will do
anything at school." And the farmer reports: "I could send more lads to
the day-school, but they are not the material Mr. Grubb requires." Mr.
Grubb was the school teacher.

This teacher, W. Balbrooke Grubb, sums up his work in these words:
"Moral training and example and the expounding of the Gospel, all who
knew these natives will admit, has [_sic_] worked a great change upon
them. Glorious conversions or wordy confessions I have not to report."

That Yahgan life was not all work and study on Keppel, however, appears
from the report of the celebration of the birthday of one of Farmer
Bartlett's children. "After tea we had several games, among which was
the avenging the death of a murdered man by the Indians, and an Indian
dance, which is a strange affair." Imagine the vendetta as an
entertainment in the course of a revival in the United States!

But the worst is yet to be told about the treatment of these Yahgan boys
on the Keppel Island farm, and lest some one think I am exaggerating, I
give the words of the report of one of the missionaries:

     "As I observed much carelessness and untidiness in the dress of the
     boys, I set aside a portion of one day in the week in which, under
     my supervision, they were encouraged to mend and repair their
     clothing." To this Mr. R. Whaits, the mission carpenter, adds that
     "they are badly clothed; boots they have none, nor blankets to
     cover them."

The unfortunate natives were not only made to toil at unaccustomed work
the whole day through, but they had to do it unrewarded. They did not
get even decent clothing in return.

I have given a good deal of space to this school, but it is because I
suppose there are other mission schools in the world conducted in the
same fashion, and the people who contribute money to missionary
societies ought to know about these matters.

Having described the school in which sundry Yahgans were civilized, and
"Tom Bridges, a good-looking, affectionate boy," was prepared for the
missionary service, we come to the establishing of the missionary
station in the Yahgan territory and the results of that work.

Until 1869 nothing was done beyond instructing the natives who could be
induced to go to Keppel and learning from them their language. But in
January of that year Mr. Stirling determined to take up his residence
among the Yahgans. His reasons for this are important, and are as
follows:

     My motive for living ashore is to exercise a direct and constant
     influence over the natives; to show my confidence in them; to
     encourage _a more general and regular disposition in them to adopt
     our ways_ and to listen to our instructions, and to get the
     children within the zone of Christian example and teaching.

Accordingly, he built on the shores of what is now called Ushuaia Bay,
near the present capital of Argentine Tierra del Fuego, a log-hut that
was 20 × 10 feet large and had walls seven feet high. Here he lived for
seven months. One of four boys who had been in England, and was
subsequently continued in his educational career by being enlisted as
cabin-boy of the mission schooner _Allen Gardiner_, became the
housekeeper of the log-house, and was assisted in the work by another
Yahgan boy. How the days were passed and the natives instructed is told
clearly in the missionary's diary:

     Wednesday, 27th (January)--Our _days_ are devoted _to work_. In the
     morning, before breakfast, prayer and catechising. In the evening,
     ditto; and what with putting the house and its surroundings in
     order, making and fencing gardens, superintending wood-cutting and
     charcoal-burning, I have passed a curious busy kind of time.

After seven months of the life thus briefly, but fully described, Mr.
Stirling was called home to England for ordination as "Bishop of the
Falkland Islands."

That he had lived unharmed among a tribe who ten years before had
murdered a missionary, is counted among the marvels of the story of this
mission; and it is quoted to show that the sort of training the Yahgan
boys had received at Keppel had tended to civilize them so much that, on
their return to their native haunts, they had in turn civilized their
fellows.

Meantime the boy Tom Bridges had grown to be a man of twenty-five years,
and had prepared himself, with the aid of those who had had charge at
Keppel, to become a missionary himself. With Mr. Stirling's approval he
went to England while Stirling was founding Ushuaia, and before Stirling
reached England Bridges had been ordained a catechist, had married, and
had sailed for Keppel Island. With the departure of the Rev. Mr.
Stirling for ordination as Bishop, Ushuaia was left unoccupied
temporarily, but the vacancy was filled in 1870 by Mr. Bridges and his
wife, who have ever since made their home on the shores of Beagle
Channel, and have until recently taken the lead in the mission work done
there.

Ushuaia Bay is a rounded hollow on the north side of the narrow Beagle
Channel. Lofty, glacier-covered mountains wall off the sun on the north,
and on every other side the ranges are not very far away. To the west,
however, there is an open table land level enough for farm purposes, and
to this came the young missionary and his wife to make a home.

They were apparently displeased with the location afterward, for we read
that "at Ushuaia our position is exposed, and being about ninety feet
above the sea is not favorable for procuring the best results. Many
spots might be chosen where, shelter and greater heat being secured, the
fruits of tillage would be both larger and more certain. But it is vain
for us now to regret our situation."

The log-hut erected by Stirling remained intact, and that was at first
their home; and straightway the work bringing the Yahgan Indians to Mr.
Bridges's standard of civilization and righteousness was begun.

What this standard was has been put in writing, together with a plain
statement of the means employed in raising the standard of
righteousness. He says:

     "Our hopes for the material improvement of these natives lie in
     their adopting and following farming and agricultural pursuits
     together with fishing." And again: "Our daily endeavor is to bind
     them with the bonds of Christ's love. To this end we have been of
     late showing them the authority of Christ as far greater than that
     of Moses."

A tribe of Indians that lived naked in a climate where snow-storms raged
in every month of the year--lived happily and comfortably, too--even in
perfect health on the spontaneous productions of the region, was to be
transformed into a community of farmers there and then. A people who had
in all their wonderful language of 40,000 words no term or idea of
either God or a future existence; who never gave an order, and who had
no such word or idea as to obey, were to be converted to Christianity
by sermons "showing them the authority of Christ as far greater than
that of Moses!"

That the missionaries entered upon this tremendous task with a calm
assurance that they could not be in error as to what the Indians needed,
is perfectly plain to all who peruse the record; and in that assurance
they never faltered. They were as earnestly determined to create
civilized villages and farming communities--that is to say on an English
model--as they were to tell the story of the Christ.

The first "material improvement" work done was, naturally enough, the
making of a comfortable home, with outbuildings and a big garden
attached, for the use of the missionaries. Mr. Bridges reasoned that an
object lesson in home comforts would impress on these wild people the
advantages of civilization more forcibly than words could do; and the
work to which Mr. Bridges devoted the most time was that of impressing
on them the advantages of civilization--_i.e._, making them like white
men. He had little faith in the notions of those missionaries who at
various times have believed they could best reach the heathen heart by
living with the heathen, suffering their hardships, learning to
understand their joys, and so on. Mr. Bridges would not do that.
Besides, in making gardens, building fences and houses, and caring for
cattle and sheep, Mr. Bridges, by employing the Indians, was enabled to
teach them the white man's arts and to encourage what he called "habits
of industry."

[Illustration: THE MISSION STATION AT USHUAIA.]

He assumed that when employed as laborers raising turnips on a Tierra
del Fuego farm, or in the saw-pit splitting logs into boards with a
hand-saw, they would be very much happier than they had ever been while
roaming at will about those seas and inlets in search of seals, birds,
and fish, or when sitting beside a roaring camp-fire inventing and
telling stories. It was, therefore, with a merry heart that Mr. Bridges,
and those, too, who were sent to aid him, saw the Indians take up the
axe to chop, the spade to dig in the garden, the saw to split the logs
for lumber.

But just how the natives were handled and the kind of life they led
about the station can be most convincingly told by a few extracts from
the record, which are in all cases verbatim, save that I have italicized
many words in order, as the missionaries might say, to bring home the
lesson of the hour more forcibly.

In a letter describing to the people of England the work at Ushuaia
after it was well under way (five years after the station was founded),
we get not only Mr. Bridges's ideas about handling workmen, but also his
way of composing a delicate family difficulty and a definite statement
of the price he paid one laborer for two weeks' work. He says:

     We need in no way be ashamed of the earthly parts of our duties
     here, and I hesitate not to set it plainly before you. _The
     society_ has now _three and a half acres_ of garden land in crop,
     chiefly with turnips (Swedish), most of which will be used by the
     natives in meat stews, thickened with flour, beans, or other
     farinaceous food. Besides, much work has been done to the road in
     carrying down the embankment, and we hope to have it available for
     our cart in a few weeks by diligent labor. A large quantity of wood
     has also been cut and brought down to the beach ready for shipment.
     Mr. Whaits has commenced sawing out boards from native wood with
     great success. We have had for weeks over thirty men employed. _The
     natives_ have also considerably added to their own lands under crop
     this year, and have _four acres_ in crop.

     Peace, with a few and unimportant breaks, has reigned. I must
     relate a few instances of its interruption: Some nine or ten men
     were at work on the road, Stephen Lucia was in charge, and a few
     were vexed that he was not silent when they were idle. Angry,
     vengeful words were spoken, and Stephen, in great turmoil of
     spirit, came to me and asked to be employed elsewhere, saying that
     he could no longer work with the men with the cart. I set him to
     other work, and I went down to the men and reproved the guilty ones
     for violent language and threatening intimidations. Stephen,
     knowing that I would speak to them, came down, and some angry
     altercation took place. Yet, after some talking over the matter,
     peace was restored, and those who were angry shook hands at my
     suggestion, and real good-will has existed among them since.

     Another occasion was in connection with a young Eastern called
     Hidugalahgoon. He came here with a wife that had been the wife of a
     man who had been very violent to her. The young fellow seemed very
     fond of her and she of him. He had friends here whom he was
     diligent to move in his favor by descanting on the cruelties of the
     other man. He was for several weeks employed, and regularly came to
     our meetings for worship and instruction. As payment he received a
     sufficiency of food and a shirt.

As to the row that the real or original husband of the woman raised when
he came on and found that she would stay with her lover, Mr. Bridges
says:

     Being consulted by Hidugalahgoon, I advised that he should, under
     the circumstances, give what he could to restore peace. No doubt he
     has been a very guilty party in the matter, and I told him to give
     up his shirt; he might soon earn another.

That is, instead of denouncing Hidugalahgoon as an adulterer, this
missionary advised him to buy off the outraged husband. The effect of
such teaching as this will appear further on.

We are not left wholly in darkness as to the kind and quantity of food
served, for, in speaking of the day's routine, the record says:

     The daily breakfast is a pound of navy bread per man. The dinner is
     cooked in our yard under the charge of Mr. Lawrence, who has one or
     two boys under him, and tea likewise. A break is made between the
     morning and afternoon working time, a space of four and three and a
     half hours, respectively, by a distribution of a refreshing drink
     of milk and water, slightly thickened with flour and sweetened.

Although not so stated here, the dinner was usually a meat stew with
hard-tack. It was served in a quantity sufficient for the workmen only,
as one may readily infer from a description written elsewhere of the
milk-and-water "refreshing drink."

     To encourage the men to work, besides the three meals daily, Mr.
     Lawrence used to bring us some milk and water, slightly sweetened,
     and a biscuit at 11 A. M. and 4 P. M. Then we would all throw
     ourselves down and enjoy ten or fifteen minutes' rest while we took
     this refreshment. The little children soon learned the course of
     things, and used generally to come for a bit from their fathers or
     brothers. They (the fathers or brothers) would have been _glad_ to
     have eaten all, but invariably they shared.

Let the reader get this matter well in hand. The Yahgans were employed
on road-making, chopping, pit-sawing and other work of the hardest kind.
The white man had sufficient influence over them to keep a good many so
employed. In return he gave to the laborers what he calls "a sufficiency
of food," but he here distinctly admits that they "would have been glad
to have eaten all"; in other words, it was a bare sufficiency. In
addition, for "a few weeks' work," he gave a common shirt such as the
farm laborers of England wear.

The rule to feed and clothe only those employed at labor was not
rigorously enforced at all times. We read at Christmas time of a
"distribution made to-day of the half-yearly gift of clothing _to the
employed_ and such natives as are more particularly under our charge,
and to children supported by friends at home; also _general_
distribution of old but most acceptable clothing sent by kind friends in
Stanley which was very much needed." Then, "after the morning service,
we all had a happy time with the natives, who were abundantly supplied
with good stew and pudding." In a letter we read that "the half-yearly
distribution of clothing to the baptized natives took place on the 28th
of June." Of course, this favoring of the baptized natives could have
but one effect. If clothing could be had by professing this new religion
the hypocrites among the tribe were pretty sure to see the point and
make the profession. As will appear further on, however, there were not
very many hypocrites among the three thousand Yahgans.

But that the system of paying a "sufficiency of food" and a shirt, such
as laborers wear, for two weeks of labor did not prove entirely
satisfactory to the Indians, save in time of famine, may be inferred
from what is written in the same record:

     The men, when left much to themselves, become very idle, and rest a
     great deal more than they should. They say they are tired and sore,
     and you have to be constantly at them to do a fair day's work. The
     natives have been culpably idle at this and all other work they do,
     and yet they clamor for more pay, and even speak of ceasing to work
     unless their pay is increased.

In fact, the missionary was quite incensed when he found that the
heathen were not willing to do the work of English farm laborers in
return for a "sufficiency of food" and a "semi-annual distribution of
clothing."

If Mr. Bridges had trouble in teaching the tribe habits of industry as
farm laborers, he was also worried somewhat in his efforts to impress on
them the advantage of the kindred virtue of thrift. As wandering
mussel-eaters they had no need of thrift, because mussels were almost
everywhere abundant, and they were lacking in food only when storms
prevented their journeying from a place which had been eaten bare to one
which had not been visited for a time. As farmers, if they were to be
farmers, they would need to be thrifty, especially so in such a climate.
But here is the record, which gives at some length not only a picture of
life at the station, but also the missionary's argument for overcoming
their ancient heathen habit of holding all things in common:

     The natives, very much driven by hunger, were very importunate in
     coming to him (the Rev. Mr. Lawrence) in order to get something to
     eat. They brought logs of fuel by ones and twos, they brought
     baskets, spear heads, and spear shafts, others offered to work to
     earn some food, others came expressing their sad circumstances and
     sought to excite pity in order to get something to eat. Only three
     men were regularly employed, but four or five women were much
     employed in making shirts, so that these were envied by the rest,
     and certainly were much better off. During this time a party of
     natives arrived and brought a good supply of sprats. As the three
     above mentioned very properly kept their food supplies for
     themselves and families, to the great grievance of their neighbors,
     so now these sprat owners would not part with any of their sprats
     to them.

     One of the three expressed himself thus about this matter: "We
     hungry folks now: all other people plenty fish, only we poor." In
     reply to these remarks he was answered, "You ought not to be sorry,
     but glad that these poor people have plenty. Besides, you ought not
     to be hungry, because you get food for your work every day, and
     your wife also gets food for her sewing, and your son can gather
     mussels."

I have quoted the record verbatim because it seems important that people
in the United States should know just how the heathen were treated at
this typical mission, and have the missionary's statement of the case.
It is a fact, incredible as it may seem, that the missionary gave to
the heathen, in return for a day's hard work, only so much food as that
heathen himself needed. To the squaw only as much as she needed was
given. Under that system of pay an able-bodied man and an able-bodied
woman could not together earn even enough food above their own wants to
supply one child. "Your son can gather mussels," said the missionary
when they complained to him that, having divided with their son, they
were hungry. It is worth while to compare the attitude of the missionary
in this matter with that of the heathen father and mother, who were
willing to go hungry in order that they might divide their stinted
allowance of food with their child. But to continue the quotation:

     I have striven very much to move the people against the prevalent
     habit of begging and giving, but as yet with but little seeming
     success. When a canoe arrives many make visits to the new-comers to
     get a share of any food they may have brought. They do not ask, but
     wait till they have received some. Each woman looks upon what
     supplies she gathers as her own. She gives to whom she will, so
     that to the same person a portion would be given by each of a man's
     two or three wives from their separate possessions. This habit is
     very hurtful.

Although it is aside from the object of this story, one cannot help
noting here that among the Yahgans "they do not ask but wait," and that
"each woman looks upon what supplies she gathers as her own." As a
picture of savage customs that is interesting.

It would be instructive and interesting, though not to say pleasant, to
follow these extracts further. They picture accurately the life led by
both missionary and Indian at this station--a life encouraged and
promoted by a society in England that had an income of from $50,000 to
$60,000 a year, and complained because it did not get more. Enough,
however, has been quoted to convey an accurate idea of what was done
there in "material" matters, and something will now be told to portray
the "spiritual" teachings and the results thereof. The record is full of
such things as these:

     Subject of this morning's teaching, "Justification by faith in
     Jesus."

     Subjects of instruction: Faith in God and its proper fruits,
     obedience to His will, love and gratitude for all His goodness, and
     confidence and joy for all His perfections.

     We endeavored to rouse the attention and lively interest in the
     free treasures of the boundless love of God, of their God, their
     Lord, their Saviour, their Judge, their heaven, their hell, their
     own offered mercy and good.

     Experienced the helping grace of God in speaking to and reasoning
     with the people of the truth of God, especially of Jesus, our
     representative before God, who in our stead has borne our sins, and
     pleads His--now by faith our--merits, on account of which we can
     alone be loved by the Father. Spoke also of the necessity of
     denying self and sin, of the works of the flesh, and the blessed
     fruits of the Spirit.

These extracts accurately illustrate the character of the preaching. The
following from the same pages of the record will, with equal accuracy,
show what the results were:

     We vary as far as we can in illustration by anecdote and
     application, and _great effort is necessary to keep their
     attention_.

     We long to see earnest love, to hear the people inquiring for
     Christ. When asked whether they love and wish to serve Jesus, they
     answer affirmatively, but _they never volunteer any remark or
     questions concerning spiritual things_.

     Visited Mecugaz twice. Spoke to him earnestly as to a dying man who
     as yet shows no real faith or special interest in Jesus Christ as
     his Saviour and Lord. The conduct of Jemmy Button, Admiral
     Fitzroy's protegé, _is ever being reacted here_. He would not tell
     the people what he had seen, but made capital of their ignorance
     and his knowledge by keeping it to himself. _He only became the
     greater impostor_, and assumed a pompous conduct toward his
     fellows, and did not a whit of good.

A paragraph will serve for one other matter. There came a time when the
missionaries wanted a steamer to replace their old sailing vessel, and
an appeal for the money needed for a steamer was made on the ground that
the new vessel would enable the missionaries to extend their teachings
to the other tribes of the region. They got their steamer, but when it
came their zeal to preach to the Ona and to the Alaculoof had
disappeared. Instead of using their steamer to carry the gospel to these
tribes, they used it to carry their cattle between the farm on Keppel
Island and the station in Beagle Channel.

However, in spite of the fact that the bay produced no food supply worth
mentioning for the natives, in spite of a sterile soil and wretched
location for farming, in spite of every drawback, the settlement grew in
numbers, until, after eleven years, in 1881, such progress had been made
that they had a "Christian village, with cottages instead of wigwams,
and an extemporized church in the midst," six frame cottages which the
Indians had made for themselves out of whip-sawed lumber. These cottages
were of the ordinary packing-case model. They were divided within into
one large "living-room" in the middle with two smaller rooms on each
side of it. Two families occupied each house, using the middle room in
common.

Cattle and goats had been introduced, and the Indians had purchased some
with labor. More than ten acres of ground were cultivated. An orphanage
had been erected, and "twenty-five children are here clothed, fed, and
educated at the expense of friends in England."

Meantime, every Yahgan at the settlement, and many of them elsewhere,
had learned to dress in "civilized garments," which they had obtained in
exchange for labor, or for the furs they caught when hunting, and a very
large proportion of them had learned to "prefer bread food" to any
other. Meantime the baptismal register had attained to a length of 137
names, including infants.

But the one point of success attained, on which the missionaries laid
greatest stress, was the change wrought in the treatment wrecked seamen
received at the hands of the Yahgans.

"The natives had formerly been set against white men by the cruel
treatment which they had met with from sealing vessels. When vessels
were seen the women and children were sent to the woods for safety,"
says the missionary record. In return the Yahgans had slaughtered every
wrecked crew of seamen that fell into their power, saving one man in
each crew, however, whom they compelled to witness the slaughter of the
rest, and whom they then took to some steamer in the Strait of Magellan,
that he might go home and warn his countrymen to keep away from that
region.

"It was only by degrees that a better state of things was brought
about," says the record but in eleven years it was done.

Naturally, this apparent success of the mission attracted the attention
of the Argentine Government. Ushuaia, "the Christian settlement," stood
in Argentine territory, but it was very close, indeed, to the Chili
line. Being jealous of Chilian encroachment, the Argentines decided to
establish a station down on the south coast of Tierra del Fuego to
defend their landed rights. They naturally chose this "Christian
settlement" as the site for the station. That was a great event in the
history of the mission, and the missionaries were all "greatly pleased"
with the sub-prefect and his staff, and troops, and sailors, and
especially with the fact that thereafter at least monthly communications
would be had with the civilized world.

But a marvellous change had been developing even for years without the
knowledge of those who had brought it about. Something was found to be
wrong with the Fuegian converts. The record begins to show such entries
as these:

     In the orphanage we have one case of fatal disease. Excessive
     languor, without suffering, is his symptom. He is rapidly wasting
     away.

     We had heard of two families who had been suffering very much and
     asked to see me. At the first house we found eleven people sick,
     and one old woman who had recovered. They told us three had died,
     and pointed out several others whom they said would die, among them
     a little boy, who held his arms out to me and said; "No, no, I am
     not going to die, Mr. Whaits."

     At the next place we found three women, a little boy, and a man
     trying to get to a canoe to come to Ushuaia. The man told us he had
     buried four, but was so weak he could not bury the others who were
     in the house. We found one dear little fellow on his back, not
     quite dead. He asked me for water which I gave him. He died a few
     minutes after. In the same house we found a man who had been dead
     two days, and in his arms a poor little boy not dead. When I took
     him away he cried to go back to his father. We took him to Ushuaia,
     but he died on the way.

     We have now lost forty-three persons in three weeks at Ushuaia. How
     far it has spread I cannot say.

     _It has been a pleasure to go among them, for in almost every house
     we have heard the voice of prayer and praise in the midst of all
     their sufferings_ [_sic_].

It is useless to continue these quotations or to tell in detail the
pitiful stories of wretchedness, uncomplaining suffering, and death that
had taken place in this settlement, when the missionaries once got the
tribe well in hand. Let it, instead, be summed up:

The race had been "hardy and vigorous." They had actually increased in
numbers while living naked and smeared with grease from head to foot.
But when put to work as farm laborers, and washed and clothed like white
folks, they complained of being "tired" and "sore," and had to be nagged
into working steadily. They had slept naked in the freezing rain, but
now, if they sat down in their shirt sleeves while at work, they caught
a cold that developed into a fatal disease. Consumption and pneumonia
appeared, and assumed frightful aspects. Little children that had been
round-limbed and bright-eyed when naked in a canoe were wasting rapidly
away in "excessive languor," though dressed in woolens and living in a
warm house.

They continued to waste away until every one of the twenty-five
children, "clothed, fed, and educated at the expense of friends in
England," died, and so did every other child in that "Christian
village," and from that day to this not one child in dozens born has
survived its first year.

The frequent communications with the civilized world had been of
advantage to the missionaries, but measles, grip, diphtheria--what
not?--came on the steamers.

But that is not all, nor, for the tribe, the worst result of the
establishing of this mission in the region. Keep in mind that "the very
ferocity of the natives of Tierra del Fuego protected them." Those are
the words of one of the members of the missionary society, and they were
true words. The ferocity of the Yahgans in their native state protected
them from the devilish evils left in the wake of sailors who visit
aborigines in any part of the world. The sailors, even the sealing
sailors, kept well clear of the Yahgans so long as this ferocity lasted.

But the missionaries fully, if "only by degrees," overcame this ferocity
and made boast of it, saying it was of "the greatest advantage to
commerce." They taught the Yahgans not to kill white men. It would have
been better for the Yahgans had a man-o'-war been sent there to kill the
half of them rather than that they should have learned that lesson. For,
alas, the missionaries made very little, if any, progress in overcoming
the Yahgan notion that women might be bought and sold. Indeed, as in the
case of Hidugalahgoon already mentioned, where one man had carried off
another's squaw, the offender was advised to settle the trouble by
paying for the woman.

The forecastle brutes from the Yankee sealers or any other vessels were
at last free to go among any Yahgans save the insignificant few at
Ushuaia, and to trade liquor and tobacco for women.

To stem the tide of disaster a new station was established at Tekenika
Bay, some fifty miles south. It was in charge of the Rev. Mr. Burleigh
and his wife until he was overturned in a boat in the bay and drowned,
when two of the grown children of the Rev. John Lawrence of Ushuaia,
brother and sister, took hold. They have a small cottage, in a wretched
climate, and sacrifice almost every comfort to do what they believe to
be good for the Yahgans.

But because Yahgan bodies were fitted by nature for nakedness in a bleak
desert, and because Yahgan stomachs digest mussels and whale's blubber
better than turnip soup or mixed milk and water slightly sweetened, the
sacrifices of these young people can only hasten the decay that has
fastened on the tribe.

As was said, here was a tribe, 3000 strong, healthy, hearty, and happy
in spite of apparent adverse circumstances. They for twenty years were
under the lead of a most adroit teacher. They listened to and said they
accepted his spiritual teachings; they reluctantly took up his farming
and mechanic arts; they eagerly sought his kinds of food and clothing.
The missionaries declare the result has been that the whole tribe is
civilized. I saw a score of Yahgans, and all to whom I spoke told me
they were Christians and that other Yahgans were Christians.

But the truth is that of that tribe of three thousand untrammelled souls
less than three hundred can now be found. Their civilization--or the
evidences of their civilization, rather--consists in the use of wretched
and dangerous dugouts in place of graceful and safe bark canoes; the
ragged cast off clothing of prospectors and seamen; wretched little
shanties like those in the New York goat district, and a partial
knowledge of English and Spanish.

Worse yet, in place of what the explorers were pleased to call the
hideous markings of paint, are the really hideous evidences of diseases
that have come since Yahgan "ferocity" ceased to be a "protection" to
Yahgan women.

Where the blame lies let the reader judge for himself, but none can
dispute that the naked savage, who in the old days stood erect man
fashion, and with furious anger fought in defence of wife and daughter
or even for plunder, was a nobler being in the sight of God and man than
the ragged, cringing hypocrite that he has come to be in these last
days.




CHAPTER V.

ALONG SHORE IN TIERRA DEL FUEGO.


Although a considerable part of the story of Tierra del Fuego has been
related already in the chapters on the Yahgans, their mission, and the
Cape Horn gold diggings, there are yet a number of objects of human
interest there which remain to be considered. According to the old-time
explorers, a voyage around the coast of this great island was one of the
dreariest as well as the most dangerous in the world. Dangerous it was
and still is, but in a well-found steamer the traveller may find a
sufficient variety in the island and its products and peoples to more
than repay him for all the risk and discomfort.

Of the Tierra del Fuego matters not yet more than touched upon there is
the settlement called Ushuaia, wherein is found the seat of Government
of Argentine's part of the island. Ushuaia is a remarkable capital. It
stands nearer the south pole than any other civilized village in the
world, for one thing. For another, it probably has fewer inhabitants
than any other capital town in the world.

Of the landing of the first white man on the present site of Ushuaia,
enough was told in the last chapter. That was the beginning of the
settlement as a missionary station. The town, as an Argentine
settlement, was founded in September, 1884, and the Argentine flag was
for the first time unfurled over the first building erected for the use
of the officials on October 12 of the same year. Ushuaia, however, was
then made only a sub-prefectura--the residence of a naval Lieutenant,
who had the powers of an American Mayor rather than those of the
Governor of a Territory. The Argentine Government was at that time very
busy planting colonies along the coast of Patagonia and at other points
south, because the dispute which it had had with Chili over the right of
possession had been settled but recently. These settlements were made to
take actual possession of the land acknowledged to be Argentine
territory, and one was necessary somewhere on the south coast of Tierra
del Fuego, because Argentine had secured a large slice of that island.

Very few people knew anything about Tierra del Fuego in those days. The
few hardy prospectors who had ventured across the Strait of Magellan
from Punta Arenas in a search for gold nuggets had not been lucky enough
to make them speak well of it. A few sheep ranchmen had gotten hold of
some pasture land on the north coast, but they had had to keep their
shepherds armed with Winchesters because of the predatory habits of the
Ona Indians who lived on the prairies of that part of the island. There
was one spot, however, where the Indians were known to be harmless,
because white men had been living among them for a long time there, and
that was the mission station on Ushuaia Bay, in the Beagle Channel.
Moreover, Ushuaia Bay was known to be a well-sheltered harbor, where the
anchor of a ship would get a right good hold on the ground. So, after
sending a fleet to erect a lighthouse on the east end of Staten Island
for the benefit of a commerce in which it had no part, the Argentine
Government ordered the fleet to go around into Ushuaia Bay and establish
a sub-prefectura. The building of such a station would tend to encourage
the exploration and development of the island, so the government
believed, and so the event is slowly proving. But just why the place
should have been raised to the dignity of a capital is past finding out,
for it was a sufficient check on Chilian aggression as a sub-prefectura,
while the expense to the government is now several times greater.

[Illustration: USHUAIA, THE CAPITAL OF ARGENTINE TIERRA DEL FUEGO.]

I saw Ushuaia for the first time under rather unfavorable circumstances.
The sky was overcast with storm clouds; roaring gusts of wind, laden
with snow, came driving along at frequent intervals, and the region at
the water level was buried under snow that was at no place less than two
feet deep. It was on the 23d of May, just at the beginning of the
antarctic winter. We had been steaming all the morning along the Beagle
Channel, under the shadow, so to speak, of the glacier-covered range
that overhangs the south coast of Tierra del Fuego, when at about noon
the range turned away to the north from the channel, making a curve so
that a half-circle of lowlands like the floor of an amphitheatre was
left between it and the line of the range. Into the westerly side of
this floor, where the waters could wash the feet of the lofty mountains,
there projected a rounded bay, the mouth of which was well guarded, but
not obstructed, by a low island and a long sandspit on the west. It was
an ideal harbor, and, after what had been said of it on board ship,
there was no difficulty in recognizing it as the site of the capital of
Tierra del Fuego.

A little later we rounded the island and then the settlement came into
view--apparently at that distance a single row of houses standing at the
water's edge. Nor did a closer approach change the appearances very
much, for although not exactly in a row nor washed by the waves, there
was only about a score of buildings all told, and none of them was above
a hundred paces from the bay.

And right curious these houses were. First of all, of course, was the
capitol building, a one-story structure in the form of a right-angled
U standing with the wings away from the sea.

This building was made of wood, and it was painted to that peculiar
shade of red that in old times was so much favored by the Yankee farmer
when he had put up a new barn. A little to the right of this stood the
home of the Governor. This, too, was a frame structure, but it was in
the form of a Central American _hacienda_--a low, rectangular affair,
with a peak roof that ran down over all four walls to form a wide
veranda on all sides. The rest of the buildings of the town can best be
described by saying they were duplicates of the dwellings to be found in
the mine camps of the United States. Every one had plain, unpainted
wooden walls, and every one a corrugated iron roof. A few had garden
plots enclosed with fences of split pickets, but the majority were
unenclosed. They were all scattered along the narrow slope of one of the
foot-hills of the great mountain range. This slope is in summer grassy.

Back of the scattered row of houses the first ridge had once been
covered with a forest, but the trees for ten rods or more up the slope
had been subsequently cut for fuel and other purposes, leaving a field
of stumps. Above the clearing the forest rose rapidly in solid rolling
ridges until six hundred feet above the sea. Then the forest thinned
out, and in clumps and bunches of brush spread up the mountain side for
a few hundred feet more, to disappear entirely at the edges of the
glaciers and banks of eternal snow that were piled among the rugged
rocks clear to the crests three thousand feet above the sea.

To add to the sombre aspect of nature incident everywhere to the winter
season is the lack, in Ushuaia, of sunshine. The Beagle Channel is in 55
° south latitude, so that in winter the nights are long and the days
brief at best, while even such lengths of days as they might have in the
open is cut down by the shadows of the lofty crests. The sun does not
get above these crests until almost ten o'clock, and it disappears again
soon after two o'clock. Even then its face is so often hid by the snow
clouds above the crests that one may almost say that the village in
winter is shrouded in perpetual gloom.

As a port Ushuaia showed a substantial wooden pier over one hundred feet
long, built by the government for the use of its officials. At some
distance from this was a smaller and more slender pier, built by a
merchant. There was anchored in the bay the dismantled hulk of what
seemed to be a big, worn-out, seagoing tug. It had really been a tiny
cruiser, however. Another vessel of a similar model, but much newer and
well painted, was a cruiser kept there at the call of the Governor, but
just what he might want to call it for did not appear. Moreover, the
tubes in her boiler had gone wrong and she could not have answered
anybody's call. In addition to these two there was quite a
fleet--say half a dozen sailboats of the sort used by Cape Horn
gold-hunters--sloops and catboats from twenty-five to thirty feet long,
while a tiny schooner that had once been used by the missionaries lay
rotting on the beach some distance around to the west. The vessels
afloat, as they veered to and fro at the ends of their long cables, gave
some air of life to the harbor, an air that was increased by two or
three Indian families, who were paddling about in the wretched little
dugouts the missionaries taught them to make in place of their
old-fashioned bark canoes of Viking model.

Here, then, in the score of mine-camp shanties along the beach and in
two broken-down hulks afloat, lived the inhabitants of the capital of
Tierra del Fuego. If the town itself was curious, its people and their
manner of life were found to be no less curious when one came to get
acquainted. Small and wretched as the place was, it had a complete
outfit of the officials and assistants needed for the dignity and peace
of the most populous territorial capital anywhere. There was a complete
list of executive officers, with secretaries and servants; a complete
list of judicial officers, with clerks and servants; a complete list of
police officials, from a commissioner to a patrolman; a file of soldiers
with commissioned and non-commissioned officers; a crew of sailors for
the vessels, with the usual officers, a school teacher (male), and a
matron for a girls' school.

The town had also six citizens--plain, every-day folks, not entitled to
wear uniform. All told, the number of inhabitants was less than sixty. I
went on shore to learn something more about the local government than
what I could see from the steamer. They told me that the Governor was
in Buenos Ayres working for an appropriation to make improvements.

"Improvements in what?" I asked.

"Just improvements about the place."

"How much money does he want?"

"Who knows? He ought to have $20,000."

"What one thing, for instance, would he do with the money?"

"Well, there is the shed back of the Capitol, where the sawmill is. That
ought to be enclosed to keep the weather off the machinery."

"Would that cost $20,000?"

"It should do so. You'd make it cost that if you were Governor and had
to live here. Nobody gets pay enough to make it worth while staying."

"Will the Supreme Court sit to-day?"

"I beg pardon."

"Will any Judge hold court to-day?"

"Oh! Scarcely. What made you think such a thing likely?"

"When are courts held, then?"

"They aren't held. No cases to be tried."

"Not even a police case?"

"No. Do the people you have seen look like criminals?"

"Certainly not. Where can I find the school-house?"

"There is none."

"Where do they hold school, then?"

"They don't hold any."

"Why not?"

"There aren't any children here."

So the questions and answers ran about all official doings, if that
term may be used in connection with the life in the town as a capital.

The truth was that the executive department of the government had
nothing to execute, so to speak. The courts had no dockets, the police
had no beats to patrol, and no criminals to arrest. The soldiers did not
even stand guard, nor had the sailors either a watch or lookout to
employ them. Of all the government employees there was but one class
that had any employment worth mentioning. The cooks and their assistants
had to labor daily. Even these were well-nigh out of a job when I
arrived. Owing to negligence on the part of some one in Buenos Ayres,
the supplies of flour and about all other kinds of food had been allowed
to run out. We carried thirty half-starved sheep to the settlement from
Punta Arenas, and these were hailed with delight, because everybody
there except the plain citizens was on short allowance.

I made a tour of the place, wading through snow up to my knees. I found
three people engaged in useful occupations. One was a squaw, who was
pulling the hair from an otter skin in the store run by one of the plain
citizens. In the kitchen attached to this store an Englishman was
getting dinner and a German was cutting meat for sausage. In all I saw
three women in the place, but it was said three more could be found.
There was not, they said, a heating stove in town, nor was there a cord
of fuel in any one pile. The men were usually found standing in what
might be called the sitting-rooms of the houses, or in stores conducted
by the plain citizens. They usually had their hands in their pockets.
All wore heavy sack coats, which were kept buttoned to the chin, while
some had mufflers about their necks. The plain citizens were composed
of Englishmen, Italians, and Germans in equal numbers. Three of them
were Argentine citizens, and the others were cosmopolitans.

When, in the course of conversation, I referred to a trip I had made to
some Colorado mining camps, the plain citizens with one accord brought
out specimens of ores that I might pass judgment on them. When I
protested that a brief residence in a couple of mine camps would by no
means make a man a judge of ores, they thought I was over-modest. They
all had specimens of gold dust, but aside from this there was nothing of
value save a chunk of iron said to have come from a limitless bed, and a
piece of ore from which a Buenos Ayres assay had obtained an enormous
per cent. of nickel.

I asked about the gardens. They said that cabbages, turnips, carrots,
parsnips, and a few other hardy vegetables flourished in the season. I
saw cabbages and turnips as big each as a peck measure, but the potatoes
were in no case larger than an English walnut. The wild grass of the
region was said to be very nutritious, and the appearance of the fresh
meat I saw in the stores indicated that it was so. One merchant, Mr.
Adolph Figue, had taken up enough prairie land on the west side of the
bay to carry 6000 sheep or more, and this he was stocking with every
prospect of success, because the Rev. John Lawrence, in charge of the
missionary station, had very fine flocks and herds in the same region.

The stores were established for trade with the prospectors and Indians.
It will readily be believed that prices were high. The prospectors
bought goods with gold dust, while the Indians traded furs, weapons, and
models of their old-fashioned canoes for the goods they wanted. The
traders found a sale for the curios on the Argentine naval transports
that call there every three weeks. The stocks carried in the stores were
liquors, navy bread and other cured foods, tobaccos, clothing, and cheap
cloths, and miners' tools. The goods are named in the order of the
demand for them.

When asked if there was anything there to interest a sportsman, one
replied:

"No. We get all our game from the Indians."

The Indians did the only out-door work that I saw done on shore. There
were goods landed from the steamer, and a gang of Yahgans from the
Mission hauled them from the little pier belonging to the merchant up to
the merchant's store, a distance of perhaps 150 yards. In spite of the
depth of snow, they used a hand-cart for that purpose. I did not see a
sled or toboggan in the settlement. If any one there knew how to make
and use a sled, he did not, apparently, have the energy to use his
knowledge. In fact, no white man seemed to have energy enough to do
anything. As said, everybody stood about muffled to the chin and with
his hands in his pockets. They gazed out of the window at the bay and
the mountains; they gazed at the goods behind the counters in the little
stores; they gazed at the blank walls and read for the ten-thousandth
time ordinances and edicts issued by various officials and pasted up
there. Doubtless all would have been glad to sit down--to gaze from
comfortable arm-chairs instead of standing up to do it. But they
couldn't do that. There were no arm-chairs, for one thing, and then the
rooms, having no fire, were too cold for comfort when a man sat down.

On the whole, a more cheerless life than that of the people of this
austral capital would be hard to imagine. They do not work. They do not
read. They do not converse more than is necessary. They neither flirt,
frolic, fight, nor fish. They have no interest in botany or zoölogy, and
they keep no record in meteorology. Their interest in geology is
confined to the finding of pay dirt, and they look for that in only the
most desultory and cursory manner. A stay of three days is, in winter at
least, enough to make any one agree that "nobody gets pay enough here to
make it worth while staying." Even the chance of enclosing a shed at a
cost of $20,000 would not keep a Yankee there much longer than the time
needed to enclose a shed.


ON A BEAGLE CHANNEL RANCH.

From Ushuaia we steamed away east for thirty miles, and there found, as
the sailors said, that the mountains on the north side had all fallen
down. In place of lofty peaks and rugged crests of rock, snow, and ice,
there were on the north side low, rounded hills, with luxuriant pastures
and beautiful forests. South and west lay Navarin Island, and this was
one huge ridge that reached far above the clouds. That is to say, the
land on the north of the channel was open to the sun and sheltered from
the fierce, cold storms that came from the colder regions south and
west. The change of climate was remarkable. There was neither snow nor
ice in sight save on Navarin Island and the distant mountain tops, and
even then it did not descend within several hundred feet of the sea.

In the midst of this charming district, living on the shore of a little
bay that afforded excellent anchorage for our steamer, we found the Rev.
Thomas Bridges, the founder of the Ushuaia Mission, but who for seven
years had been engaged here as a ranchman and farmer. All of the pasture
land in sight, and more, too--eight square leagues lying along the
Beagle Channel--belonged to him. On the prairie-like Gable Island he had
a flock of 4500 sheep that needed no other attention than an occasional
visit and shearing in the season. On the mainland he had herds of
cattle, a band of horses, and a great drove of pigs. He had miles of
picket fences enclosing his pastures. He had a great garden patch on a
sunny slope, where all the hardy vegetables grew in profusion and
potatoes attained a size to make the Ushuaia product seem worthless. His
house was a great, two-story frame enclosed with iron--in form and
convenience like the house of an English country gentleman of
wealth--though the appearance, due to the iron, was somewhat _outré_.
There were sheds and storehouses near by, and a pleasant pavilion on the
lawn that overlooked the bay. Afloat was a great lighter for carrying
the produce of the farm to the steamers and the imported goods ashore,
besides a regular fleet of small boats, cutters, and sloops, for
pleasure and for visiting various parts of this estate, with its
twenty-four miles of water front.

Nor was the interior of the mansion in any way behind the general
appearance of the estate. There were rich articles of furniture, a
library (probably the only one worth mentioning in Tierra del Fuego),
pictures, and bric-à-brac. As a home, the house showed but one thing
that could be criticised, and that was the room in one corner where
clothing, food products, tobaccos, tools, etc., were kept for trading
with prospectors and Indians, but that has probably been removed by this
time to a separate building erected for the purpose.

The family of Mr. Bridges consisted of himself and wife, his wife's
sister, two charming girls under sixteen, and three sturdy boys, only
one of whom, a lad in his teens, was at home, the other two being on
other parts of the estate. To aid these in the work of the estate, there
was a small colony of Yahgan Indians living in little houses that were
located behind a hill out of sight of the great house. The squaws had
been taught to do housework, of course, and the men the heavy work of
the farm. In addition, each male member of the family had a young Indian
valet.

Ranching on the Beagle Channel (this ranch stands further south than any
other in the world, by the way), is very profitable, according to Mr.
Bridges, in spite of the high latitude and the distance from the market.
The sheep yielded enough wool to net a gold dollar per head, in addition
to which the increase of the flock that season had been 108 per cent. of
the ewes. The care of his herd of cattle cost something, because at that
time he had to have a man ride the range to keep the cattle from
straying off up among the mountains, but when a fence, then in course of
construction, was completed, the cattle would in every way rustle for
themselves. The pigs, too, cost nothing. They roamed the forests, living
on the tiny nuts the antarctic beeches produce, and certain vegetable
and fungus growths produced by nature. This food produced most excellent
pork for cured meats. Such labor as was needed was furnished by the
Indians, who were satisfied with the food the ranch produced, and
sufficient clothing for themselves and families, in lieu of cash pay.
The long experience which Mr. Bridges had had as a missionary had taught
him how to manage the Yahgans without friction and at small expense.

As to the market, the wool was shipped to England, via Buenos Ayres. The
surplus pork, bacon, beef, and vegetables were sold right on the farm to
the prospectors and wandering Indians, who came with gold dust and furs.
The prices obtained were something to make glad the heart of any farmer,
bacon bringing an English shilling a pound, and fresh beef sixpence. On
the whole, Mr. Bridges must have an income not much below $8000 a year
in solid gold from his ranch, besides the increase of his stock, and the
improvements he is making in the estate.

The acquiring of this estate cost Mr. Bridges very little. The land was
given to him by the Argentine Government under circumstances which show
that he is an adroit man of business. In 1887 there was quite a stir in
Buenos Ayres over the Argentine portion of Tierra del Fuego. The
government had sent Don Ramon Lista, a traveller and man of letters, on
an exploring expedition along the east coast. Herr Julius Popper, a
German engineer and man of letters, had conducted a prospecting
expedition across the island and had found gold in quantities around San
Sebastian Bay. The stories and lectures of these two men filled the
newspapers for some time. At the height of the interest Mr. Bridges, the
missionary, arrived in town and delivered a lecture or two on the island
as he knew it, and on the wonderful Yahgan tribe of Indians. Especial
interest was paid to the Yahgans, and the populace became enthusiastic
over the missionary who had passed so many years of his life in that
out-of-the-way region. Taking advantage of this, Mr. Bridges said in the
course of one lecture:

     Our life among the Yahgans has been eminently practical, with a
     view of leading them to cultivate the soil, keep cattle, build
     permanent huts, and live in a more orderly and settled manner. The
     improvement which has taken place in their condition since is
     wonderful. They have learned the arts of civilized life. They have
     acquired the skilful use of firearms, and some of them are splendid
     sportsmen. They are acquainted with the value and use of money,
     English or Argentine, a good sum of which is continually passing
     through their hands, as they prefer selling for money rather than
     bartering. They occasionally visit Sandy Point and the Falkland
     Islands, and are thus thrown in contact with a civilization which
     they are anxious to attain to.

     My object in coming to Buenos Ayres has been to obtain a grant of
     land in the Beagle Channel on which to create a farm, and employ
     native labor upon it, thus seeking to supply a want in reference to
     agricultural products which we have long felt, and at the same time
     insure the well-being of some of the natives.

Land on Beagle Channel did not then seem of much consequence to the
people of Buenos Ayres, so Mr. Bridges, under their influence, got a
water front twenty-four miles long as a gift from the National
Government. It was the only stretch of land fit for a ranch on the
channel, and he got it all.

An officer of the steamer I was on said the land was given under the
impression that it was to be used by the missionary for the benefit of
the tribe, and that even then Mr. Bridges would not have got it had the
government known that the "wonderful improvement" in the condition of
the Yahgans, of which the lecturer spoke, had been confined to a handful
of individuals, while the tribe, as a whole, had dwindled from 3000
healthy heathen to a few hundred diseased beggars.

However, Mr. Bridges had told just what he came for--to get land "to
create a farm and employ native labor," and so supply a want for
agricultural products "which we (the missionaries, of course,) have long
felt." Mr. Bridges supplies agricultural products for a price, and he
employs some Yahgans, who, as he believes, are better off when sawing
logs by hand into fence rails for his ranch than they were in the old
days sitting around an open fire eating whale blubber and telling
stories. As to the prices he charges, it must be said that he merely
shows good business tact. They are always considerably less, even
according to those prospectors who do not like him, than charged by
Ushuaia merchants, though still from three to five times as much as
charged at Punta Arenas (Sandy Point), in the Straits of Magellan.

The prospectors, disposed to criticise Mr. Bridges for making the best
business possible of his farm, alleged, without offering any proof of
their charge, that Mr. Bridges got his money for stocking the farm by
taking clothing which generous people of England sent to the mission for
gifts to the naked savages and trading it to the Indians for furs, which
he sold for his own private benefit. I do not believe he did that. It
appears from the missionary record (see page 56, _South American
Missionary Magazine_ of London, March, 1879, and page 39, February,
1881, for instance), that the missionaries did trade with the Indians
for furs, and that the clothing which the Indians received was usually,
but not always, paid for with either labor or furs. The missionaries did
sell clothing sent out to be given to the Indians, but they made no
secret of it, and the donors learned the facts in the magazine. The
missionaries did not want to pauperize the Indians, they said, by
giving gifts. But the profits of these trades went to the society. In
1881 Capt. Willis of the mission schooner in a letter spoke dolefully of
the prospect for buying skins on the society's account, "as there are so
many sealing vessels out." Capt. Willis spoke also (see page 233 of the
magazine) of three canoe loads of Indians who "exchanged otter skins for
clothes, and were eager for tobacco."

The missionaries should not be accused of misappropriation of goods
simply because the thrifty society wanted to increase its cash income by
trading at a tremendous profit with the Indians, for whose eternal
welfare it had been created.

Of course Mr. Bridges has been trading with the Indians on his own
account, but it was, no doubt, with goods purchased with his own money.
One reads so much of the dangers and privations which fall to the lot of
missionaries that the fact that they all receive good salaries is always
overlooked. The salary of a missionary down there was never less than
£120 per year cash, while he received his board and lodging free in
addition, of course. Then there was land at Ushuaia where the
missionaries could pasture herds bought with money they saved from their
incomes. They naturally took advantage of their opportunities. They
bought cattle and sheep which were carried there on the society's yacht.
The climate and the pasture favored them. The herds and flocks
increased. What with his lawful private trade and his lawful stock
business while a missionary, Mr. Bridges, no doubt, had ample means for
stocking his farm when he left the society's service to turn farmer that
he might "insure the well-being of some of the natives." With his
twenty-four miles of waterfront, his cheap labor--the cheapest, for the
purpose, found anywhere--and his ready access to market, Mr. Bridges
will, doubtless, become one of the wealthiest land-holders in the south
part of the continent.

There is one other point which a captious critic might bring against Mr.
Bridges, but is one the prospectors would not be likely to think of.
Some of the land he now holds once belonged to a number of Yahgan
families. Their title was not the indefinite one which a tribe might
make to the territory it occupied, but a very clear title--a title that
any civilized government would acknowledge. It was theirs by right of
possession and improvement. The Yahgans had built houses and had fenced
and cultivated this land before Mr. Bridges thought of getting it for
himself. One would like to know that Mr. Bridges bought the rights of
these Yahgans after he acquired title from the Argentine Government, and
that he paid for them more liberally than he was accustomed to pay for
labor on the mission grounds.


ON THE PRAIRIES OF TIERRA DEL FUEGO.

Mention has been made of the fact that although all the adventurers in
the South Sea were ready to enslave and kill fellow-men found under
other flags, and endure all sorts of hardships, as well, for the sake of
gold, they nevertheless sailed right past Tierra del Fuego without a
stop worth mentioning regardless of the sea beach and grass-root placers
that were to be found at many points along shore. Almost equally curious
is the fact that the Spaniards in the eighteenth century and the
Argentines in these last years should have spent much money in planting
colonies on the desert coast of Patagonia when north and east Tierra del
Fuego, with a better climate and a soil very much better, lay idly
awaiting appropriation. The parts of Tierra del Fuego, with the
adjoining islands that made the old explorers shiver, were all to the
south and west. The "most savage country I have seen" was found by
Captain Cook on the weather side of the Andean range, where it rises
south of the Strait of Magellan. All Tierra del Fuego, save for that
west coast range, is a great alluvial bed, the work of floods operating
during untold ages; and Tierra del Fuego is a triangle-shaped island
almost as large as the State of New York. In the old-time mud lie the
bones of old-time monkeys, kangaroos, and parrots drowned in floods in
the days when Tierra del Fuego had a tropical climate. It is apparent
that in old days there was a strait across Patagonia where the Gallegos
River is now found, and there is a distinct break in the Andes there.
So, too, on Tierra del Fuego there was a similar break running across
from San Sebastian to Useless Bay. Both regions are rising rapidly from
the sea also. But, unlike Patagonia, the low parts of Tierra del Fuego
are well-watered prairies, while the foot-hills of the mountain range
are covered with forests of saw timber.

In addition to this, the climate is, considering the latitude and the
proximity to Cape Horn, marvellously good. The reason for this is, of
course, found in the height of the mountain chain, and of the
mountainous islands west and south. These fence off the storms that
cover the mountains about Ushuaia with ice and snow. A snowfall of six
inches is counted deep on the prairies, and if it lies forty-eight hours
on the ground the circumstance is remarkable. On the other hand, there
are sufficient falls of rain to keep the prairies covered with the most
luxuriant grasses. Because frosts come in every month it is not a good
farming country; but, on the other hand, it is rarely cold enough to
freeze over the fresh-water ponds.

Probably Argentine has the best part of the prairie region of Tierra del
Fuego, but the first attempt to take advantage of the rich pastures was
made at Gente Grande Bay, opposite Punta Arenas. Mr. Steubenrach, the
British Consular agent, seeing that sheep flourished on the more sterile
plains of Patagonia, got a concession from Chili on the Tierra del Fuego
side, and after erecting fences and buildings, carried sheep there from
the Falkland Islands, "placing a missionary in charge of the farm." The
hiring of a missionary was a diplomatic stroke. He was expected to
civilize the Ona tribe of Indians living on the prairies and make
shepherds of them. This work was begun in approved fashion. Pow-wows
were held and presents distributed. The Onas in increased numbers came
to the ranch, and made many signs of good-will. But they stole sheep by
night, nevertheless--rounded up great bunches of them, which they drove
away to some convenient spot, and then hobbled them by breaking their
hind legs. In this condition the sheep could still feed and the Onas
could feed on them at will.

Thereat the missionary held more pow-wows and argued the matter with
them. He explained that eternal perdition awaited the souls of Indians
who stole sheep. The Indians were not troubled by that prospect. Indeed,
it is said, they wanted to know what awaited white men who took land
from the Indians without paying for it, and they could not or would not
understand the reply the missionary made to them. They seem to have been
as obtuse in understanding points of law regarding land titles as North
American Indians have always been. So they went on taking sheep in lieu
of rentals for the land.

Finding that threats of future fire did not avail him, the missionary
sent to Punta Arenas for Winchesters and men to use them. Thereafter the
propagation of sheep and the growth of barbed wire fence, and the
slaughter of Indians went on together in right merry fashion, for
everybody but the Indians and an occasional white man caught napping.

The sheep business is spreading slowly, as all things are done in
Spanish American regions, but it is a sure growth. It will eventually
cover all the grass land of the island, in spite of the Onas, just as it
spread in Australia in spite of the black fellows, and as cattle spread
in Texas in spite of the Comanches.


THE ONA INDIANS.

The Ona tribe is a distinct race inhabiting the prairie region of Tierra
del Fuego. The traveller who goes around Tierra del Fuego in the
Argentine transports is sure to see several--children and women, as a
rule, who have been captured by the soldiers that make occasional forays
from two of the three stations that the Argentine Government maintains
on the island. One of these two stations is at Paramo, mentioned in the
chapter on the gold diggings, and the other is at Thetis Bay on the
southeast corner of the island. At both of these stations one may
usually find a couple of officers and a soldier or two having their
families with them. The Ona children are used as servants in these
families, and when the families return to Buenos Ayres they carry the
youngsters along with them. I saw a full-grown girl and a half-grown
boy, brother and sister, taken there in the steamer I was on.

In the city they get "a sufficiency of food" and a "semi-annual
distribution of clothing."

It was the doings of a party of Ona Indians that gave Tierra del Fuego
its name. The Onas have always inhabited the part of the island which
Magellan first saw, and their habit of signaling one another by means of
fires led them to make extraordinary smokes at the marvellous spectacle
of the ships of the navigator. Magellan naturally called it the Land of
Fire.

It is a curious fact that the Onas have been mentioned very little in
the stories of Cape Horn travellers in comparison with what is said of
the Yahgans and the other tribe of the region called the Alaculoofs.
Nearly all of the early navigators fell in with Alaculoofs, but so far
as I remember only Darwin and Fitzroy make special mention of the larger
and strange tribe of the prairies of Tierra del Fuego. Cook did see some
and he partly describes them, but he did not understand that a part of
the clan he saw was, as his illustration seems to prove, of the Yahgan
tribe and part of the Ona.

The reason the Onas were overlooked is made plain to the modern
traveller. They were a land tribe; they did not make canoes and they had
no horses. The Indians with canoes came off to the ships of the
explorers. The Onas could not do so. Moreover, the explorers kept to the
north shore of the Strait of Magellan, east of the narrows, because of
the more sheltered anchorages there, and so they saw the Tehuelches of
Patagonia, but missed the Onas.

People who know the results of white visits to aboriginal tribes will
congratulate the Onas.

[Illustration: AN ONA FAMILY.]

Modern explorers of Tierra del Fuego,--the prospectors and the plainsmen
of Patagonia, believe that the Onas and the Tehuelches are of one
origin. In proof of this it is alleged that the languages of the two are
so much alike that the two tribes understand each other when brought
together.

This brings us to one of the most remarkable facts in connection with
the Onas. They do not build boats and neither do the Tehuelches of
Patagonia, but considerable numbers of Onas have been found in Patagonia
and may still be found there.

How these Onas got over to Patagonia without a boat is an interesting
question, but it is not unlikely that they swam across on some hot day
in summer at the first narrows in the Strait of Magellan. A strong
swimmer could easily cross there at slack water, in spite of the low
temperature of the strait.

The Onas in their native land have no horses. They have in these last
years captured a good many from the sheep men, but they have eaten them
as fast as they got them. Horse meat is the greatest of delicacies to
them as it is to the Tehuelches. Their chief dependence for food is the
guanaco that abounds in Tierra del Fuego and a prairie squirrel. In the
chase they depend on bows and arrows and the bolas chiefly. But the Onas
often kill the guanaco by surrounding a bunch and running them down.
Thus the Ona has become, probably, the best cross-country runner in the
world. One shepherd told me that often, when mounted on a first-class
mustang, he had been obliged to chase an Ona five miles across the plain
before he could get "within killing range of the thief," and even then
the Indian was not unlikely to double or dodge and escape altogether.

The picture of an Ona Indian flying for life across the prairies with a
relentless horseman in pursuit is something to stir the blood of the
spectator; it would stir the blood of a citizen of "the boundless
plains" of the United States in one way, and that of "the Quakers in the
effete East" in another, however. But it is a picture often seen in
these days in Tierra del Fuego.

The home of the Ona is as bad as any in the world. A saucer-shaped
hollow big enough for a bed for all the family is scooped in the ground.
In the little ridge about this poles and brush are placed, and over the
weather side of the brush is thrown a skin or two. The fire is usually
built just without, but near the door of the hut. It is more useful for
cooking food than for imparting warmth. The Onas at night allow the fire
to go out. To protect themselves from the cold they resort to a novel
blanket. They all lie down on the ground with the children in the middle
of the huddle, and then call their dogs to come and lie around and over
them. It is a poverty-stricken Ona family that has not enough dogs to
cover it out of sight. The dogs are a sharp-nosed but hairy lot, and
they certainly keep the family warm.

The fact that all the tribes of the Cape Horn region build such wretched
houses has always been taken as a proof of their lack of intelligence.
How great a mistake was thus made in the case of the Yahgans has already
been shown. The Onas, as will some day be learned, are also misjudged.
The reason for building so frail a shelter is apparent on a brief
consideration of their method of life. They are necessarily nomads. When
the food of one spot was eaten they had to migrate. Now, the Onas had no
horses or beasts of burden, as did the Tehuelches. They could not carry
big skin tents about as the Tehuelches did. So they built a temporary
shelter only. In the coldest weather a location near the seashore, where
mussels and fish abounded, was usually chosen, and there they built
larger and better wigwams. When they migrated to Patagonia and acquired
horses they made skin tents. They did not make poor shelters from any
lack of intelligence.

The skin of the Ona is remarkably white for one who lives all but naked
in the open air. Their hair is black, but lustreless, and they have a
curious habit of singeing off the hair so as to leave a tonsure on top
of the head just where the North American Indian allowed the hair to
grow long for a scalp lock. The face is oval, the eyes dark and
pleasant, the cheek bones not too prominent, the nose sometimes quite
prominent, and the mouth full and with regular but yellowish teeth.
Because whiskers come late in life, and so are an indication of coming
age, the men pluck them out, through a desire to appear young; but after
thirty-five they let the beard grow because of the pain of pulling so
many hairs as then come. They are remarkable for using combs made of
whalebone. No other tribe near Cape Horn does that.

Their shoulders are broad and strong and the chests deep. The mothers
have hanging breasts, but those of the maidens are well-rounded and
firm. The arms and limbs are round and sinewy, but the stomach,
especially after a square meal, is very prominent.

Of the capacity of the Ona's stomach, one story will serve. A girl of
about fifteen, who was captured on a northern ranch, refused to eat for
eight days, and then appetite got the better of her temper. A sheep had
been roasted whole for the dinner of the rancher's family, but the Ona
girl was allowed to begin on it, and seeing that her appetite was good,
she was not interrupted. When she had finished, so they say, she had
cleaned all the bones of the sheep.

For making a fire the Onas carry bits of iron ore, which come from an
island in the Alaculoof region, west of Tierra del Fuego, and are
obtained by barter with that tribe. Flints and agates abound in the Ona
country, and these with the ore and a bit of dry fungus, always carried
wrapped in a bit of hide or a bladder, enable the Ona to light a fire
even in a rain-storm.

The Ona bows are made of native wood worked into shape with shell knives
where civilized knives are not to be had, but so many prospectors have
been killed by them in recent years, that the tribe is fairly well
supplied with cutlery. Then, too, barrels drift ashore from Cape Horn
ships, and the iron hoops are made into knives. The ships also supply
materials for tips for the Ona arrows in the shape of whiskey bottles.
Very fine points are made from glass by the Ona artisans. The arrows are
made of a kind of reed, and are so light as to be well-nigh useless when
fired against the wind.

Very little is known of the Ona language, save that it is as harsh as
the Yahgan is liquid. Their religious beliefs, too, are unknown. When in
distress, as when captured by the whites, the old cut long and deep
slashes in the chest with any sharp thing at hand; but when once they
find themselves well treated they become bright and cheerful and
affectionate, and rarely evince a disposition to leave their captors.
From what is said of these captives (who are in all cases held, as said,
practically as slaves, in that they receive only food and clothes for
their labor), it is plain that the Ona is an aggressive warrior toward
the whites only because of ill-treatment.

When the Rev. Bridges and the Right Rev. Sterling once made a journey
across the island they had not one bit of trouble. They did not kill
anybody, did not have any cause for firing a gun, or making either an
aggressive or defensive movement. Damnable ill-treatment on the part of
the whites is at the bottom of all the Ona aggressiveness--and Ona
suffering.

The only effort that has been made to alleviate the sufferings of the
Onas at the hands of the whites was the establishing of a Catholic
mission near San Sebastian Bay. When I was there no success had been
attained by the mission. On the contrary, a priest, who had gone with a
guide to seek for the Onas, had failed to return, and when a party of
sailors from the nearby sub-prefectura went to look for the two, they
found their heads only. The Onas have been made to suffer so much that
they will not now trust any one.

When prospectors have disappeared only their bones have usually been
found, and these were always marked either with fire or human teeth. The
Onas eat the whites they capture, hoping thereby to obtain the white
man's valor.

In their fierce fight for their homes, the Onas have an advantage in the
fact that the dividing line between the Argentine's and Chili's shares
of the island runs through the heart of their country. Each white nation
is very much opposed to allowing the other to invade its territory with
an armed force, and so the efforts of the sailors and soldiers of either
side must end near the line, if not on it. So pursuit of the Onas is
always ineffectual. Nevertheless, the shepherd will drive them into a
corner at last by extending his wire fences, and then extermination will
come.

It is an interesting fact in medical science, that the Onas a long time
ago discovered a sure and speedy remedy for the chief ill that Indians
are heir to through association with the whites, in a decoction of the
thorny bush that grows on the plains, and is known to science as
_berberis_.


THE ALACULOOFS.

One tribe inhabiting the Cape Horn region remains to be mentioned. It is
found exclusively among the islands west of Punta Arenas and Cockburn
Channel. I wish that I had the facts for describing it. This is the
tribe that has been mentioned so often by people passing through the
Strait of Magellan. They were invariably called Fuegians by all who saw
them, and were described in terms to indicate that they are the most
wretched, the most filthy, the most degraded, and the most terrible
beings on earth. As I said, I should like to know the facts, for these
descriptions, except as to their appearance to a casual observer, are
valueless. The Yahgans were described in equally severe terms.

On the beach at Punta Arenas the citizens pointed to a dismantled sloop
that was hauled up to be sold at auction. She was a ragged thing, say
twenty feet long. There was a large hatch amidships with splashes of
blood on it, and a number of holes where Winchester bullets had come up
through the boards from below. She bore the name of _Teresina B._ With
four men as a crew and a cargo of tobacco, rum, old clothes, matches,
hard bread, cheap cutlery, etc., she had sailed away from Punta Arenas
for a trading voyage to the Alaculoof Indians. Her crew were bound, in a
small way, on a voyage like that of the great Magellan; they meant to
get valuables in return for things of little value. When about
forty-five miles south of the town they sent a man ashore in a small
boat for wood and water, and that was the last ever seen of the man. The
next morning three canoes loaded with Indians came in view. Thereat one
of the white sailors urged the sloop's captain to make the Indians stay
away, or at least to permit but two or three men in one canoe to
approach at a time. To this the captain replied that the Indians were
Christian Yahgans from Ushuaia, and just what were wanted.

[Illustration: ALACULOOF INDIANS.]

"Very well," said the sailor, "you may do the trading. I'll go down
below."

He went below and drew the hatch almost to its place and fastened it.
The captain and the other sailor remained on deck to trade, the sailor
sitting over the companionway.

As the Indians drew alongside it appeared that they were Alaculoofs
instead of Yahgans, and they dropped their paddles, and, grasping their
harpoons, attacked the whites. Both white men were badly wounded by the
first harpoons thrown. The sailor fell into the cabin, his head badly
cut, and all life apparently gone. The captain had life enough to try to
crawl down, but the Indians were on him, and he was harpooned to death.

Then the Indians swarmed on the sloop, and the man who had fled to the
hold opened fire with his rifle. The Indians tried to get at him with
their harpoons, but the white man's weapon was too much for them, and
they had to flee.

This is the story the man who hid in the hold told after he got back to
Punta Arenas, bringing the body of the captain and the wounded sailor.
It may be true. The Indians have been swindled and openly robbed,
maltreated, and murdered often by these Punta Arenas traders, and if
they did not retaliate sometimes one would not think well of them.

Early in 1894 the Catholics of Punta Arenas established a mission
station in the Alaculoof territory. Possibly this mission will do the
Indians good instead of harm.




CHAPTER VI.

STATEN ISLAND OF THE FAR SOUTH.


When the ordinary citizen of New York city hears any one speak of Staten
Island the name at once recalls to his mind a host of pictures of
ferryboats crossing a beautiful bay; a landing where vociferous men in
uniform and rapid-transit trains await the rush of passengers; shady
avenues leading over rolling green hills; charming cottage homes with
grassy lawns and tennis courts about them; booming town sites; a sea
beach devoted to fun that is hilarious rather than joyous; oyster beds
and fishing smacks--a most remarkable conglomeration of metropolitan,
rural, and alongshore life, and all within a half-hour's journey of the
city which he proudly calls his own. To a few--to a gray-haired merchant
here and there down town, a few grizzled watchmen about the shipping,
sundry skippers of the ships where the watchmen are employed, all of
whom have seen service in the sealing ships of twenty-five years and
more ago--a reference to Staten Island awakens memories of an entirely
different nature. Instead of the smooth waters of New York harbor they
think of a boisterous sea; instead of leafy avenues, bordered by
charming homes, they see only foaming surf, with dark and threatening
cliffs; instead of the pleasures of tennis court or the hilarious dance,
they remember only the whizz of a hurricane in a ship's rigging, and
work on deck when drenched by icy sleet and rain. The one knows only the
Staten Island that bounds the south side of New York bay; the other
knows as well, perhaps is much more familiar with, that other American
Staten Island lying more than 7000 miles away in the Cape Horn region.

No more lovely Indian summer day was ever seen than the first day of the
Antarctic winter, June 1, of the year 1894, as enjoyed by the passengers
and crew of the Argentine naval transport _Ushuaia_, as she steamed out
of the east end of Beagle Channel and headed for the Strait of Le Maire,
bound to St. John harbor, in the east end of the Antarctic Staten
Island. The air was soft and warm, the water dimpled, the leaves on the
waving trees ashore flashed in the sunlight, the distant snow-capped
mountains rose through a dreamy haze. And so the conditions remained
until the sun went down and the slender arc of the new moon appeared
among the luminous mists of the western sky. To the passengers the
prospect of a delightful night was all that could be asked, but the old
salts shook their heads.

"You just hold fast all till midnight," said one to whom a passenger
spoke enthusiastically of the weather. "To-night is the change of the
moon, eh?" and he nodded his head toward the west.

[Illustration: GOVERNMENT STATION AT ST. JOHN.

FROM A SKETCH BY COMMANDER CHWAITES, A. N.]

Sure enough, by midnight a northwest gale fit to twist the life out of a
ship was roaring over the water, and the little _Ushuaia_ was pitching
and tossing along like a Newport catboat in a cross sea. She was then in
the Strait of Le Maire, and a worse current for a contrary wind can
probably be found nowhere in the world. It is a rush of broken water
hurrying along at from five to six and a half knots an hour, while the
tide rips, formed by the eddies off the capes on both sides of the
strait, are something to make a seaman gasp. Luckily for us, we had a
seaboat of a model fit even for a maelstrom, and with scarce a sea on
deck we labored through the worst of it, and at daylight next morning
the outline of "the rugged inhospitable Staten land was visible amidst
the clouds" on the starboard bow.

Thereafter we cruised along, heading to the east, for several hours
within a very few miles of the coast, and the passengers gathered on
deck to gaze on such landscapes as only those who travel out of the
usual way may enjoy. And certainly it was a view worth all the
discomforts of a long and stormy voyage, for here is found the end of
the mountain system of all the Americas. Cape Horn Island is, in a
sense, the south end of the Americas, but the backbone of the hemisphere
bends to the east at Mount Sarmiento on Tierra del Fuego, and running
along the shore of that great island is broken by the Strait of Le
Maire, as it was broken by the Strait of Magellan, only to appear again
beyond the narrow water in the cliffs and ridges and gulches of Staten
Island. It is not until one has been on or around Cape St. John, on the
east end of this island, that he can accurately say he has rounded the
southern end of the American continent.

It is true that at first glance one would scarcely recognize any
relationship between the Rocky Mountain system and the ridges of Staten
Island, but one does not need to be a geologist to recognize a certain
similarity on a closer inspection. And nowhere will the similarity be
recognized more quickly than when passing New Year's Islands, just off
the north coast of Staten. Here on these islands, small as they are, the
traveller sees a tiny picture of the plains of Colorado, below Pike's
Peak, and if he will but land there, and wash a panful of dirt, he will
find at the bottom the kind of dust that has made Cripple Creek famous.

As seen from the passing steamer, Staten Island is a continuous ridge
varying for the most part from 2000 to 3000 feet above the sea. The
sides seem steep and the tops are rounded. The snow line in June was
about 1000 feet above the sea, but the use of the word line should not
be understood to imply that the snow ended at any well-defined limit.
Not all the crests 2000 feet high were white, and on the sides of the
mountains the drifts and blotches of snow sometimes reached down to
within 500 or 600 feet of the surf. Still, there was comparatively
little snow below an altitude of 1000 feet, and not much bare ground
above that limit. At a distance of five or six miles the colors of the
uncovered parts of the mountains were dark grays and black. The rocks
looked very like the rocky declivities one may see all along the Hudson,
though in no other respect was the scenery like that on the Hudson. A
closer view of the island showed that the darkest shades of the mountain
sides were green rather than black, and were due to wide masses of
vegetation, among which tree trunks could be distinguished with a glass.
But there was no sign of animal life ashore.

Over the sea, however, as we steamed along, the air fairly teemed with
antarctic life. Ducks in flocks a half mile long drifted and sailed
hither and yon. The little Cape Horn pigeons, whose black backs and
wings are most beautifully mottled with white, floated in scores and
hundreds in the air about the ship, sometimes so closely that one could
almost touch them with the hand. The huge white albatross, with its
ten-foot spread of wings, careened up and down and around, as if for the
pure love of the motion, while coal black gulls--the web-footed ravens
of the sea--contested with their light-colored cousins for the refuse
thrown from the ship. Then there were the penguins. Once, as we steamed
along, we ran into a flock of them, and sent them diving from wave to
wave--in on one side and out on the other--in a way that at first sight
made the spectators think that they were a school of fish, short and
thick, black on top, and with a white stripe on the side, skurrying away
for life. Even now, as I think of them, I am haunted with a doubt as to
whether, after all, when I thought I saw webbed feet and outstretched
neck, I was not mistaken, so great was the resemblance of the fleeing
penguin to a fish. And then there was a tiny kind of gull, the male of
which was almost pure white--a bird that seemed little, if any, larger
than a robin. It was a most wary and most sprightly little fellow, and
it almost always preferred diving to flying. In short, nowhere in the
whole voyage of the _Ushuaia_, of which the trip to St. John harbor was
but a small part, did I see bird life so abundant, so varied, or so
beautiful and interesting as off the coast of Staten Island.

By ten o'clock in the morning we were plainly approaching the barren,
bold promontory that faced the giant seas at the east end of the island.
The gale of the night before had moderated considerably by that time,
but the nearer we approached the headland the more boisterous did the
sea seem to be before us. To the passengers who did not know the place
we seemed to be rushing into a tide rip more dangerous than anything we
had seen, but just when we were preparing for the tossing that appeared
inevitable, the frowning coast line opened. A fiord between the
mountains was seen off the starboard bow, and we at once headed in for
it. The tide rip off the east end of the island, a rip that has mention
in all the coast guides and charts of the Cape Horn region, begins at
this harbor.

As we entered the mouth of the fiord, we could see that on a rock
jutting out from the westerly side was a building in form and apparently
in size the exact counterpart of the six-sided peanut and candy
pavilions one can see about the picnic and other resorts near New York.
Its peaked roof was surmounted by a bulbous cupola like the top of a
tower of a Jewish synagogue, and near by was a tall flagstaff from which
the blue-white-blue Argentine flag flapped vigorously in the gale.

By and by we got pretty close under this rock, and then we could see
some men in naval uniform standing on a ledge beside a little cannon,
which they fired off just as we ran from the breaking waves that were
dashing across the mouth of the harbor into the oil-smooth water within.
The ship answered the salute with a roaring blast of her whistle, and
then we rounded the crag where the pavilion stood, and found ourselves
in what looked like a bowl-shaped bay, walled in by precipices so high
as to make our vessel seem utterly insignificant. Then on one side of
this bowl, fifty feet or so above the water, was seen a row of little
light-colored wooden houses, built on a narrow bench on the mountain
side. There was a flagstaff before the largest of the buildings, and a
neat picket fence before the whole row. From the centre of this fence a
stairway ran down the steep decline from the bench to the beach, and
from the foot of the stair a narrow pier projected a hundred feet into
the bay. There were davits on both sides of the pier, with boats hanging
to them, and not far away was a big lifeboat of heavy model lying at
anchor. The grass that had grown below the water line of the lifeboat
was so long that it could be seen a hundred yards away as she rolled
lazily in the dead swell.

As soon as we had cast anchor a couple of officers and a crew of sailors
came down to the pier, and then rowed off to us in one of the boats.
There were enthusiastic greetings between those in the boat and their
friends on the ship.

The little row of houses built on a cleft, so to speak, in the side of
the rugged mountains that border St. John Bay is known among Argentine
seamen as the "Sub-Prefectura del Puerto San Juan del Salvamiento." It
was established late in the Antarctic summer of 1884. It should be kept
in mind that the chief object of creating a Government post on Staten
Island was for the support of a lighthouse to guide ships bound around
the Horn, but a secondary consideration was the providing of a place of
refuge with a depot of provisions for the crew of any ship so
unfortunate as to be wrecked thereabouts. It was estimated that from
seven hundred to one thousand ships of various nationalities pass within
sight of Staten Island every year, and that before this light was
established about one in a hundred was wrecked there. These estimates
were wrong, but they had the effect of establishing the station.

In the United States the crew of a first-class lighthouse consists of
three men. That of a life-saving station consists of a coxswain and not
less than six men. To man the third-class lighthouse on Staten Island
four men were provided, while in addition to the coxswain and crew of a
lifeboat there was a naval officer of the rank of a lieutenant, known as
the prefect; a second in command of a lower rank, a secretary to the
prefect, a valet, a cook, a baker, and a file of soldiers.

Having learned this much while on the ship, it was with a great deal of
curiosity that I climbed from the boat to the pier and walked ashore.

The foot of the bluff had been terraced with spiles to keep the seas
from washing out the soil there, and it was said that a northeast gale
sent an ugly swell into that part of the bay in spite of the shelter of
the point on which I had seen the pavilion. Under such circumstances,
the only perfectly safe anchorage for a vessel was further up the fiord
around a bend. Although the _Ushuaia_ seemed to be anchored in a
bowl-shaped bay, there was really a passage through what seemed to be
the western wall of the bowl, and a plan of the whole fiord as laid down
on the chart was really of the shape of a sock.

The stairway up from the pier had a railway of wooden timbers, with a
winch at the top designed for hauling up and lowering the boats, but it
seems never to have been used. At the head of the stairs was a bell that
had been taken from the English ship _Guy Mannering_ that ran into the
rocks not far away during a fog in 1892. From the stairs we went to the
Governor's house. The Governor was at home in Buenos Ayres on a
vacation, but his assistant, with the secretary, did the honors. They
had a very good quality of brandy, and very good wine, also. The house
was built of planed pine. It was somewhat in the form of a right-angled
U, open toward the fiord. The house was ceiled instead of plastered, and
was plainly but comfortably furnished. That is to say, it was
comfortable for one who could enjoy that climate unmodified by
artificial means. To a citizen of the United States the Governor's house
was lacking in the one thing most necessary for comfort in a climate
where cold and stormy weather is the rule and the thermometer never goes
above 12° centigrade. There was no heating stove in it. With the
exception of the cook, the baker, and one sailor, that entire crew lived
day and night in a moist atmosphere, where the thermometer ranged from
30° to 40° Fahrenheit almost every day in the year.

From the Governor's house a trail led along the mountain side, across a
roaring brook, with waters as black as those in an Adirondack stream,
and off over the crest of the promontory that half closes the mouth of
the fiord. The Governor told me it was a well-made road, and, except for
a ten-rod strip across a swamp, it was paved with stone. In the swamp
there was a stone here and there--almost enough to enable an active man
to cross dry shod. For the last thirty yards before reaching the end of
the promontory the trail was a narrow goat path on the crest of a
precipice one hundred feet high, facing the sea. With the mighty waves
from across the ocean thundering against the foot of that great wall,
throwing their spray high over its crest, and at times sweeping pebbles
from the pathway, with the solid water rising up as if to grasp the
wayfarer, that is a trail of which one may well think with a feeling of
awe as well as of delight.

On a level table of solid rock at the end of this path stood the little
six-sided pavilion I had seen from the sea. It was built of wood, with
an iron roof, and the three sides toward the sea were filled with window
glass in frames that could be removed. Inside the pavilion and facing
these window frames stood two benches like two steps of a stairway. On
the lower bench was a row of three locomotive head-lights. On the upper
were two head-lights with a ship's anchor light (Fresnel lens) between
them. The little pavilion was the lighthouse of St. John's Cape, Staten
Island, in the route to the Horn.

In a little room at the back of the pavilion were the materials for
keeping the lamps clean and bright. The place seemed to be well kept. A
small wooden shanty near by was the bunk-room of the four men who
attended to the lamps. A telephone was in one corner of the pavilion,
but the line to the prefect's house was out of order.

Returning to the little settlement, I found that the bakery was a
log-house, and so was one of the storerooms. In store it is said that a
sufficient supply of dry and salt provisions for six months is kept.

While looking about the buildings one of the sailors came to me, and,
speaking in English, said he had heard I was from New York city, and
thereafter for ten minutes I was kept busy answering questions asked
with the eagerness of one who has a great longing to hear from home. By
and by he was willing to talk of himself, though anxious to conceal his
name, "because I do not want my people to know how I am living. They
would rather I was dead than what I am." He had been the unruly member
of a wealthy German family in New York, and had a great desire for the
sea. He was placed on the schoolship _St. Mary's_, and in the spring of
1883, when almost ready to graduate, had had a fight with one of the
ship's naval officers, after which he jumped overboard, swam ashore,
and later shipped on the Yankee war ship _Nipsic_, which some time later
sailed to Buenos Ayres. There he deserted her, and, having picked up a
little Spanish, shipped in the Argentine navy as a full-fledged seaman,
the navy department there preferring men who could speak English. He was
afterward sent to Tierra del Fuego to man one of the stations
established there in 1884. Then he went back to Buenos Ayres, where he
readily got employment in a mercantile house because he spoke two
languages, besides Spanish, fluently. He lost his job through
dissipation after a while, and then drifted back to the navy. Once more
he went to Tierra del Fuego, and there picked up a good-looking young
squaw for a companion. When transferred to Staten Island he was allowed
to take her along. I visited the strange couple in their home. It was a
house 8 × 10 feet in size and 7 feet high. The frame was wood, and the
covering sheet-iron. It had no ceiling of any kind. The furniture
consisted of a bed, a chair, a table, a packing case, a couple of
chests, and a heating stove for burning wood. And that was the only
stove of that kind I saw south of Buenos Ayres.

The young man was an excellent penman, and so had what he called a soft
snap. He kept the books and did the writing generally of the station,
while the other members of the crew of his rank had such hard work to do
as the station required. I asked him if he was ever homesick, and he
said he was not, except when he happened to meet a Yankee, and that had
not happened before since leaving Buenos Ayres. He was receiving $30
paper (say $7.50 gold) a month, with rations and clothing for himself
and squaw. The squaw took good care of him, and did laundry work besides
for the officers.

"I do not care for what you call civilization," he said. "I have
everything I want that is within the reach of a poor man anywhere. I am
very much better off than the workingmen in New York. Why should I not
be contented? If I ever make a pile I'll go back, of course. I may take
Cheenah there sometime, anyway, if I can do it without being recognized.
She wants to go and I want to please her. But if I don't strike it rich,
what do I care?"

I have given this much space to the young man, because it is the true
story of a boy who ran away to sea, and so will be of interest to other
boys who would like to run away as he did.

A tour afoot over the island would be interesting, though a journey of
great hardship. The coast line is but a series of fiords and bays.
Behind New Year's Island, on the north side, is a bay that sets in
almost to the centre of the island. Another from the south comes almost
to meet it, the waters being separated by a low neck of sand, say 300
steps across. The traveller can find here the wreck of an old tramway by
which the Yankee sealers, say fifteen years ago, used to run their
whaleboats from one water to the other. It is certain that this neck of
sand did not always exist. The scientists say that Staten Island is
rising rapidly--that some of the bays now too shoal for a ship to enter
afforded good harbors in the days when the discoverers of the region
were beating to and fro. However, these two bays are still fair harbors,
and the sealing crews used them every year. One finds old kettles and
vats used for trying out the oil of the hair seal and the sea lion, as
well as of the whales that were once numerous. There is also an old
shanty that would be useful still to any crew so unfortunate as to be
wrecked there. A couple of gold-hunters, who worked the sand on New
Year's Island with success in 1893, used the old shanty as headquarters.
A whale may be seen about the island now and then in these days. So,
too, may a few seals and sea lions, but there are not enough to pay
working as yet, although the hunt was abandoned there some years ago,
and the game is slowly increasing.

To travel along the beach of the island is impossible, save for short
stretches. The sea breaks against the almost vertical cliffs for the
greater part of the way. The way over the mountains has been attempted
occasionally. Singular as it may seem to one who sees the rounded
contour of these mountains--a contour which one thinks would give a
perfect drainage--the chief obstacle to a tramp overland is the long
succession of bogs and swamps. There are bogs that are impassable to a
man without snow-shoes, which lie at an angle of thirty degrees with the
horizon, if one may believe the crew of the St. John station. The bogs
are masses of moss, roots, and rotten vegetation that hold water like a
sponge, and yield under the foot as slushy snow would do. Where the bogs
are not found there are wide breadths of forests, and very interesting
as well as impassable forests they are. At the sea level the trees may
be from thirty to forty feet high, with slender trunks and flat, thick,
interlaced tops. As one works his way up the mountain the trees are
found to be smaller, but standing closer together and having the tops
more closely interlaced, until at last, with a forest three or four feet
high, one can almost walk on the flattened tops of the trees--one could
so walk with the aid of Norwegian skees.

Since the fur and oil industry was destroyed, Staten Island has
produced nothing for export. That some part of the island could be
devoted to sheep-raising there is little doubt. The Falklands, where M.
Bougainville vainly endeavored to plant a French colony, now support
about 2500 people, who are all well to do through raising sheep. The
centre of Staten Island has the best climate, and, according to those
who have climbed about the region, a ranch properly located would make
its owner rich. An advantage which Staten Island has over the Falklands
is in the supply of wood, but this, on the other hand, would compel the
building of fences to keep the sheep out of the brush. Besides, there is
so much good land for sheep in Tierra del Fuego yet unoccupied, that no
one is likely to try to develop such resources as Staten Island may have
for many years to come, unless, indeed, some one be found bold enough to
brave the certain dangers of the seas for the sake of the gold on New
Year's Island.




CHAPTER VII.

THE NOMADS OF PATAGONIA.


The story of the nomads of Patagonia living east of the Andes--the
Tehuelche Indians,--is, on the whole, more cheerful reading than that of
either of the other tribes of the region. For over 350 years after they
were discovered by white men they maintained an undisputed sway over
their desert territory. They were visited by missionaries, but were
never brought into the enervating subjection to them that ruined the
Yahgan. They were physically and mentally a noble race of aborigines,
and when at last they went down before a merciless civilization, they
fell, man fashion, face to the enemy.

Brief space will suffice here for a resumé of what history tells of
them. It was on April 1, 1520, when they first saw "men with faces like
the snow." Magellan had happened into St. Julian harbor. They came with
wonder to see marvellous vessels that brought him, and it is said that
they tell around their camp-fires to this day of the trick by which he
succeeded in loading two of their chiefs with chains that he might carry
them away forever.

The Tehuelches were afoot, then, but it was not many years before
horses from the Spanish settlement at Buenos Ayres had spread to the
Strait of Magellan, and so the explorers of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries found them mounted. They were not a vicious race;
on the contrary, they were of kindly deposition, and even playful when
well treated, though their experiences with the whites eventually taught
them duplicity, theft, and outrage. But their good dispositions did not
attract white settlers, because the whole of Patagonia, east of the
Andes, was a desert that seemed wholly incapable of supporting a
civilized being.

However, the Jesuits came to them bringing the cross in one hand and
apple-seeds in the other. The cross did not flourish, but the
apple-seeds planted about the lakes in Western Patagonia grew into a
great forest, that has produced abundance of fruit and much strong cider
ever since.

Later still, at the end of the eighteenth century, Spain attempted to
establish colonies at Rio Negro, Port St. Julian, and Port Desire. They
did some little trading, but the Indians very properly mistrusted the
good faith of the whites, and in 1807 Patagonia was once more abandoned
to the natives, save for the one post on the Rio Negro known as Carmen
de Patagones. This was maintained partly because of the great salt
fields found on the desert near the town. But the terms on which it
remained unmolested by the lordly Patagonians were exceedingly
humiliating to the Spanish rulers of Buenos Ayres and of the settlement.
The whites had to pay an annual tribute of cattle, knife-blades, indigo,
cochineal, and other goods as rental for the Indian-owned land they
occupied.

We read in the history of the State of New York that in the days before
the Revolution, the brave old Mohawks used to send a warrior, now and
then, alone among the Hudson River and even the Long Island tribes,
entering this or that village, walking in the midst of a group of the
head men, and while they cowered in his presence, addressing them as
squaws and denouncing them for this and that failure in their duty to
the noble tribe he represented. In like manner, even until within
twenty-five years of this writing, has a Tehuelche chief from the desert
of Patagonia been known to ride alone down the main street of Carmen de
Patagones to the plaza. Reining in his horse by the low-peaked stone
monument still to be seen there, he would shake the great skin mantle
from his brawny shoulders, strike the butt of his spear a ringing blow
on the pedestal of the monument to call the whites about him, and then,
in disdainful words and with imperious manner, ask why the tribute had
been delayed. All of this the whites bore meekly and meanly. They could
not fight the Indians successfully, and they were willing to submit to
such treatment because of the profit in the trade they carried on with
their red masters.

If any one wants fully to appreciate how degrading trade is to the human
soul, let him read the stories of white traders among red buyers.

In modern times--rather in the nineteenth century, two efforts to
convert the Patagonians to Christianity have been made, one of which is
of especial interest to American readers, because undertaken by a
citizen of New York at the behest of the American Board of Christian
Missionaries of Boston. One Captain Benjamin Morrell had been on a
sealing voyage along the Patagonia coast, through the strait and up the
Chili coast, and on returning had brought an interesting story about
the aborigines. The story was printed in book-form and the missionary
society people read the book, and were thereby led to send out a couple
of missionaries to look over the region and the people Morrell had
described. Mr. Titus Coan, then a student at the Auburn Theological
Seminary, and a Mr. Arms of Andover were selected. A sealing schooner
took them to the Strait of Magellan, and on November 14, 1833, at the
beginning of the warm season there, they landed. That they were kindly
received and well treated scarce need be said. They brought a tent and a
variety of articles, which were of the greatest value to the Indians,
but they were never robbed. On the contrary, they were freely supplied
with the best the Indians had. In return the missionaries did some work,
such as sharpening knives, making wooden spurs, etc., but, on the whole,
the missionaries lived on the charity of the Indians. Their experiences
and thoughts have been preserved in a book entitled _Adventures in
Patagonia_, by Titus Coan. They travelled about with a host that for a
time was composed of Tehuelches or Patagonians proper, and of Onas who
had come over from Tierra del Fuego. They had to live on such food as
the country supplied, of course, and to endure the vicissitudes of the
climate.

They remained only a few days more than two months, leaving the region
in a sealing schooner on January 25, 1834. They had had enough of life
with a nomadic race on a stormy desert like Patagonia. Horseflesh was
not suited to their stomachs nor tent life to their inclinations. The
Indians had told them plainly that no missionary could succeed who would
not live Indian fashion, and that settled it. Of course these
Patagonians had souls. Mr. Coan was sure those souls were going to be
lost--absolutely sure of it, unless, indeed, some one taught them "the
way of life." But there were souls elsewhere in the world that needed
saving, too--among the South Sea islands, for instance, where snow was
unknown, and horseflesh was not esteemed a dainty. It would be much more
comfortable to convert wicked South Sea Islanders than Patagonians.

As was said, for 360 years after Magellan's infamous disregard of the
rights of man, the Indians of Patagonia in their conflicts with white
aggressors held their own. It was a pity in the eyes of a humanitarian
that there should have been conflicts, for all were utterly needless,
but, on the whole, the Patagonia day was bright.

Then came the setting of the sun. The day of all the Patagonian Indians
was ended. The "progress of civilization" demanded the extermination of
the desert races. The pressure of Christian owners of cattle and sheep
for new pastures demanded that the best of the hunting grounds of the
Indians be taken. The frontier of settlements in Argentine had to be
extended to the Rio Negro because cattlemen wanted the land, and the
cheapest way to make the extension was by war. In these matters the
civilized people of the Argentine have been as much like the civilized
people of the United States as two bullets from one mould.

This war of extermination cannot be described here, but one feature of
it may serve to give the reader some idea about its general
characteristics.

It was not uncommon for the soldiers to take a stalwart Indian prisoner,
and after tying him so that his struggles would be unavailing, to cut
his throat slowly with a dull knife.

"I have often seen them haggle away at a Tehuelche throat--haggle and
saw, while he writhed and begged for the stroke of grace, for full five
minutes before the artery was severed and his life-blood made to spurt
out on the sand. And while they tortured each victim thus, they would
turn to any one not of their nationality and say, by way of apology for
their cruelty:

"'He is no Christian.'"

So said a German to me in Buenos Ayres, a man who had been with both of
Roca's expeditions, and of whose veracity there need be no doubt
whatever.

Shocking as was the cruelty meted out to the Indians, only the sight of
it could stir the indignation of the spectator more than the excuse for
it which the soldiers gave--"he's no Christian." And yet, before the
reader's feelings lead him to a bitter condemnation of the soldiers, let
it be remembered that, according to the orthodox religious teachings in
these United States of North America, there were in the air, about each
group of those Argentine soldiers, numbers of evil spirits watching the
torture of each unfortunate Indian--watching with eager malice the
moment when the Indian's soul should be released, that they might bear
it away to the realm "where the worm dieth not and the fire is not
quenched." The soldiers tortured for five minutes, but these devils will
torment each Tehuelche soul for all eternity. And, what is more, could
the reader enter the precincts of the unfortunates and ask why the soul
was tortured, he would get, word for word, the very excuse the Argentine
soldiers gave:

"He is no Christian."

The home region of the Tehuelche is a section of the bottom of the South
Atlantic Ocean lifted up where man can see it. There are salt lakes and
beds of salts, left there when the sea-water was for the most part
drained away. There are traces of ocean salts everywhere. It is an
alluvial region; a well-driller would find many layers of sand, gravel,
clays, etc., but no rock beds, save in a few places where volcanoes
bubbled up, nobody knows when. The only volcanic rocks the traveller
alongshore will see, however, are at Port Desire and south of the Rio
Gallegos. At Port Desire the bluffs on the north shore are volcanic,
while some leagues south of Gallegos is a range of volcanic peaks that
show conspicuously above the plain. Elsewhere the traveller sees only a
desert that is for the most part level, but has been worn into gulches
along such streams as exist and shows, as one travels inland, a
terrace-like formation. It is an arid desert for the most part, "but
springs and fresh-water streams can be found every hundred miles or so.
You will rarely have to pass more than one night without water if you
journey from Punta Arenas to Buenos Ayres," as an official at Santa Cruz
said.

But inhospitable as the desert seems to be, it has afforded during the
knowledge of man subsistence for herds of guanacos and flocks of
ostriches, probably the only beings that survived all the changes in the
region since the days when monkeys, parrots, kangaroos, and elephants
abounded in the unsubmerged parts. The desert seems to have been
peculiarly well adapted to guanacos and ostriches, and the flesh of
these with dandelions, bunch grass-seed, fungi, etc., seems to have been
peculiarly well adapted to sustain a race of men that were physically
magnificent. An official at Punta Arenas told me that the measurements
of one hundred Tehuelche men, taking them as they came to the
settlement, gave an average height of over five feet ten inches. When
it is considered that some of these were half bloods, or men having had
Argentine and Chilian fathers, the average indicates a great race. The
missionary, Titus Coan, found a noticeable number of men six feet six
inches tall in his day. Rarely, if at all, will such a one be found now,
but the gauchos and others with whom I talked assured me that men of six
feet three and four inches were quite common. Patagonia has always been
a region favorable for developing the human frame, and in the days when
the Tehuelches were horseless, and so had to outrun afoot, the ostrich
and guanaco, there were giants beyond doubt among the race that averaged
the tallest on earth. Their frames were not only large, but their
strength was prodigious. A man in health could really drag a balky horse
across the desert.

By the Indian standard they were a handsome race. The men showed
intelligent, vigorous minds in their faces. Their foreheads were high,
their noses of the Roman type, the nostrils not unduly expanded. Their
teeth were simply perfect; so were their eyes. Those I saw in the
settlements showed a heavy, stolid expression, but the gauchos said that
look was not a good indication of their character; that when in their
desert wilds the men as well as the women were a merry-faced, laughing
lot. The young folks are everywhere bright-faced and of cheerful
dispositions. The young women are said to be particularly attractive,
having very light skins for Indians, beautiful limbs, firm and
well-rounded breasts, heads poised like young queens, and faces that
show a mingling of modesty and coquetry quite impossible to describe or
catch with a camera, but nevertheless within the appreciation of even a
blasé beholder.

[Illustration: A TEHUELCHE SQUAW.]

Like many of their white cousins, the Tehuelche girls continually chew
gum--the exuded and hardened juice of the incense bush that abounds on
the desert. So, too, do the Tehuelche men, for that matter, and they say
it preserves the teeth. Certainly no people have finer teeth than the
Tehuelches.

It is impossible to give anything like an accurate estimate of the
number of red inhabitants of Patagonia, either now or at any period
since the days of Magellan. The Rev. Titus Coan thought the Tehuelche
tribe numbered 1000 in 1833. Don Ramon Lista, an Argentine writer and
explorer of good repute, says that when he was among them just before
the war of extermination they numbered 500 warriors, or nearly 3000
souls all told. There are now a few at Coy Inlet, a few hanging about
each settlement, and a few along the Andes--perhaps 500 all told,
according to the gauchos.

For an estimate of the Tehuelche mental calibre we can readily resort to
their mythology, fables and proverbs of which, fortunately for
ethnologists, a number have been preserved. The scientific world is
especially indebted to Don Ramon Lista, who was careful, when among the
Tehuelches, to collect as much of what may be called their literature as
possible. As examples, here are two Tehuelche fables:


THE FATE OF THE BOASTER.

A fox challenged a stone to run a race. The stone begged to be excused.

"Let us run down the slope of this hill," insisted the fox.

"I am very sorry, but you had better keep out of my way."

"You think to overtake me? What foolishness! I run like the wind."

"We will run," said the stone.

The fox darted away like an arrow. The stone began to roll, and then to
jump and to jump, until it wounded to death its rival just as he was
arriving at the foot of the hill.


THE REWARD OF A DESIRE FOR VAIN DISPLAY.

A panther met a fox wearing a crown tuft.

"What a beautiful ornament you wear! How did you make it?" said the
panther.

"Very easily," said the fox. "I cut open the head with a flint, and then
introduced into the wound the beautiful plumes of an ostrich."

"How admirable! I wish to go through the same process. Would you take
the trouble to do it for me?"

"With a thousand pleasures."

And the fox rasped the head of the panther till the skull got thin, and
then broke it in with one stroke of the flint.

So the panther died.

Here are three proverbs:

The dog follows the fox and kills it, but then comes the panther and
kills the dog.

Nothing spurious can be good.

The little feather flies more swiftly than the great one.

       *       *       *       *       *

In his religious beliefs the Tehuelche is as interesting as in other
matters. There is one good god and from him all good things come. He is
so good and kind that he is never offended. He does not require worship
from the Indians, but according to the gauchos they have a ceremony of
thanksgiving peculiarly interesting. In the early summer, when the young
of the guanaco and the ostrich are numerous and easy to take, ostrich
eggs still to be had and pasture is at its best, the Tehuelche cacique
gathers his clan and decrees an offering to the good god. Thereat a
young mare is lassoed, brought to a convenient spot, and there thrown
down and secured on her back so that she cannot thrash around with her
hoofs. Then all the people gather around while the man who is handiest
with a knife draws his keenest blade, slashes open the breast of the
mare, cuts out the heart, and holds it, still quivering, up in the
presence of all, that it may become the offering by all of a living
heart to the god to whom they give thanks.

They believe in evil spirits and there are medicine men and medicine
women among them. Curiously enough, the medicine women are commonly
young and the handsomest of their clans. These medicine mixers drive
away evil spirits by incantations, but if the ordinary medicine fails,
then all the men assemble, and, mounting their horses, ride furiously
around the camp, firing guns into the air and waving their war-like
implements about their heads. Apparently here is a field in which the
Salvation Army missionaries would be very successful. The home of the
soul after death is in the sky--somewhere in the blue vault they see by
day, and the road to it lies by the way of the glories of the west at
sunset. Of old they used to burn all the effects of the deceased that he
might have them in the other world, but now a small outfit of horses and
dogs is sufficient.

With them the witch and the sorcerer are stern realities, but the
Tehuelches never torture their supposed witches to death. The desert air
never trembles with the moans of old women whose misfortune it is to be
sullen or insane. But when one cuts his hair or trims his finger nails
the clippings are carefully burned. So, too, are all effects left behind
when moving the wigwams. The witch is supposed to obtain a devilish
power over any one when she can get hold of any such part of him.

In dreams--"when the heart sleeps, the mind sees a glimmer of the things
to come," they say.

In music the Tehuelche is not much of an artist. The skin of a guanaco
stretched over a hoop or bowl makes a drum. The bone of an ostrich leg,
with holes cut into it, makes a sort of flute, which in turn is used to
make the sinew cord of a bow to vibrate with a tum-tum noise.

The Tehuelche year begins in September, and the lapse of it is noted by
the position of Orion. The four seasons are known as the fat time, or
the fall; the cold time, the season of new grass, and the season of
ostrich eggs. The moon measures the months, and one word serves for the
name of the day and the sun.

In his astronomy the Tehuelche has named the Southern Cross the track of
the ostrich, and therein has shown himself superior to the whites in at
least one matter. The milky-way is the path of the guanaco, and the
clouds of Magellan are the guanaco wallowing places, while Mars is the
carancho, a conspicuous, eagle-like vulture common on the desert.

Following the tendencies of the age, the Tehuelches have become
republicans. There are chiefs now, but in the old days the chief was a
deal more of a ruler than now. In these days the chief is to the clan
what the ablest and most experienced of a party of hunters in the
Adirondacks is to his associates. He knows the woods and woodcraft
better than the rest, and the rest therefore listen to his advice. In
the quarrels over trivial matters in camp the head man will often serve
as peacemaker, because where a quarrel spreads a division of the clan
follows, and the chances of success in hunting are greatly diminished.
It takes a good many people to draw a circle around a bunch of guanacos
in an open desert.

The marriage ceremony begins with an exchange of presents between the
bridegroom and the girl's parents. Then a small tent is erected for the
young couple and they are placed in it until night, when all the people
gather around as big a fire as they can make near the tent. As the fire
burns up at its brightest the males, beginning with the chiefs and
ending with the boys, dance, in sets of four, while the squaws look on
critically. The dress of the dancers includes a breech clout, a sash
about the shoulders, and two feathers in the hair. The divorce ceremony
consists in leading the woman back to the tent of her relatives, a
ceremony rarely known, however. As the head of a family, the Tehuelche
is kind and considerate to the woman and very affectionate to the
children. They pet and fondle and kiss each other and use words of
endearment. Sometimes they quarrel in the family, of course. There are
white men a plenty--even Americans, alas, who beat their wives. So there
are Tehuelches who do so.

On the other hand, although the story of it may seem like a fable to the
reader, the truth is, that hen-pecked husbands are found in as great
proportion among the Tehuelches as among the whites. But, on the whole,
it is agreed by all who know the Tehuelches that in their homes they are
the happiest people imaginable.


A CIDER FESTIVAL.

The one vice--rather the root of all evil--among the Tehuelches is the
love of liquor. Robes, weapons, horses, daughters, and wives will all be
exchanged for rum, and there are traders crossing the desert every day
of the year seeking out their camps to sell the stuff to them. Then,
too, there are apple orchards on Lake Nehuel-Huapi. In the season great
festivals are held at the orchards. Then the apples are made into cider
in skin-lined pits, and the fermented stuff is consumed in vast
quantities. The Tehuelche, when drunk, becomes quarrelsome, and murders
are then common, although the squaws hide all weapons before a festival
begins.

The weapons of the Tehuelche are like those of the gaucho--lassoes,
bolas, and knives. They also make bows and arrows, spears and what the
gauchos call "the lost bola." The lost bola is simply a stone of
convenient weight at the end of a three-foot cord. It is intended for
battles only, and is called lost bola because when thrown it is not
usually recovered again. The effective range of this lost bola is
ordinarily 100 yards, and in some hands twice that. Iron bolas are the
favorites, because being smaller for the weight they have a longer
range, and because, too, they are more easily seen and recovered after a
cast across the dull-colored desert than pebbles are. The Tehuelches
carry guns and pistols to some extent, but chiefly for use against the
spirits.

Because of his use of the bola the Tehuelche is, in a sense, a sportsman
as distinguished from a pot hunter. The game has a running chance for
life. However, the usual way of capturing game is for the men to draw a
circle about a bunch of guanacos when pumas and ostriches are often
enclosed and killed. When on the march the women with the pack train
serve as a part of the enclosing circle.

The tent of the Tehuelche is a large affair. It is what would be called
in this country a shelter tent, or a lean-to open in front. It is of
rounded exterior, like the fourth part of an orange. It has a frame of
forks and ridgepoles, and is covered with guanaco skins. Other skins
serve to divide the interior of the tent into rooms. Whole families and
their guests go to bed in a single room in the out-of-the-way parts of
the United States, such as the mountains of Kentucky and West Virginia,
but the Tehuelches are modest enough to divide their sleeping places so
that parents and children, boys and girls, and guests are separated by
curtains of horsehide. For beds they have cushions made of coarse
blankets stuffed with guanaco wool, and they know the comfort of
pillows, which are made of soft skins stuffed with guanaco hair.

They are very modest in dress. From the time they are five years old
they wear a cloth secured about the loins by a belt. To this the women
add a gown in these days, and the inevitable robe of guanaco skins,
while the men and women both wear the robe and boots made of the skin of
a colt's hind legs. The old style of boots stuffed with straw that gave
the name of Patagones to this really small-footed race was abandoned
soon after horses were introduced.

In sexual morality, it is said, when the subject is first broached to
the gauchos, that the Tehuelches are a bad lot, but when one asks for
details he finds that in their natural state they were by no means
lascivious. They have been corrupted terribly by the traders who swap
rum for furs, but all the whites agree that the Tehuelche women were by
nature modest and delicate, and, when compared with other aboriginal
women, at once most patient, bright, cheerful, and helpful companions,
and faithful as well.

For cooking the Tehuelches use the long steel bar common among gauchos
for suspending a roast over the fire. The gauchos say the Indians are
always in such a hurry to begin eating that time to cook a roast through
is never allowed. The outside of the meat will be crisp, and even
burned, while the centre is still raw. No matter; steaming slices are
slashed off, and, dripping with hot juices, conveyed to the mouth. But
having tried some of these slices myself, I can advise the reader to
wait a like opportunity before condemning the Tehuelche's taste in
roasts. Besides that, one must keep in mind that they are greedy only
after a long fast, and that under such circumstances even the lordly
white man has been known to eat half-raw meat. They also carry big
kettles for boiling, and a rather better outfit of dishes than the
gauchos use. These things they get of the whites in exchange for ostrich
plumes. In the old days they used to broil their meat on the coals, and
even now they fill small animals with hot stones and then bury them
(hides on) in the embers, and so make a right good dish.

They are called dirty--even vile--because they oil themselves all over
with the marrow of ostrich bones. As a matter of fact they are in most
matters cleanly. They bathe daily when near a lake or stream (the men
separate from the women), and when the floor of a tent is by accident
fouled the careful squaw always cuts out the earth to a depth of two
inches and throws it away. They are also called dirty because they eat
the viscera of animals, the lungs, stomach, etc. They also eat unborn
guanaco kids and unhatched ostriches. One can tell about such doings in
a way that will make the Tehuelches seem to be a very disgusting lot.
And so the descriptions generally run. But when one remembers some kinds
of food the most civilized white men eat, there is found to be very
little difference in such matters between the two races.

[Illustration: TEHUELCHES IN CAMP.]

Indeed, when one has seen these Indians--has noted their self-restraint,
their dignity, and gracefulness of looks and bearing, their gentleness
and consideration one for the other, the utter lack of servility among
them; more than all, when one has noted the brightness of their minds,
the ease, for instance, with which they learn a foreign language and
grasp ideas entirely new and foreign to their environment and habits of
thought--one all but loses patience with the pride of race and egotism
of religion that have named them savages.

A visitor to the meeting place of the Société d'Ethnographie of Paris,
sees upon the wall above the President's chair this motto:

_Corpore diversi, sed mentis lumine fratres._

The truth of that motto is never more apparent than in a contemplation
of the Indians of Patagonia.




CHAPTER VIII.

THE WELSH IN PATAGONIA.


A most remarkable colony is that which the Welsh have made in Patagonia.
Rarely, if ever, in the history of the Americas have emigrants from the
old country been surrounded by conditions and circumstances so
discouraging as those to be described in this story of that colony, and
rarely, if ever, has a colonizing project originated as did this the
Welch colony that is now flourishing on the banks of the Chubut River,
750 miles southwest of Buenos Ayres. Although one must really see the
country to appreciate fully what the colonists endured and have
achieved, yet I fancy that some of the facts are of sufficient human
interest to make the story fully worth the telling.

The colony is known by the name of the river on which it is
located--Chubut. It was formed by immigrants who left their homes,
paradoxical as it may seem, because they were patriots. They were all
Welshmen, who, because the laws of Great Britain have compelled the use
of English in Welsh schools since the year 1282, when Prince Llewellyn
fell, determined to found a colony in such an out-of-the-way part of the
world that they could, unmolested, perpetuate the mother tongue of
Wales. The prime mover in this matter was Dr. Michael Jones of Bala
College, and he was assisted by Mr. Lewis Jones, who is now a resident
of the colony.

These gentlemen looked the maps of the world over, and they read the
descriptions of all the unsettled parts which travellers out of the way
had written, the ultimate conclusion being that no habitable country in
the world could offer such complete isolation as the Patagonia region of
the Argentine Republic. There came a time afterward when they began to
doubt whether the land they had chosen was really habitable, but it was
then too late to turn back.

An appeal for a grant of land was made to the Argentine Government, and
that is an appeal that is never made in vain by any colony acting in
good faith to any Latin-American Government. It is true that efforts
were made to dissuade the Welshmen from going to Patagonia, but those
efforts were intended for the good of the colonists. They were asked to
take the fertile lands of the north instead of the desert of the south.
No one but the promoters of the colony believed that any settlement
could exist in the desert, and never did promoters come nearer to losing
heart and yet succeed.

It was on July 28, 1865, that the Welsh pilgrims first landed in the
region they had chosen. At that time the whole of Patagonia, between Rio
Negro and the Strait of Magellan, was in precisely the same condition
that it was when Pedro Sarmiento's colony starved to death in the
strait, when Cavendish discovered Port Desire, and when Darwin explored
a part of the remarkable Santa Cruz River. Nor was that all. War was
incessantly waged between the people of the republic (who were pleased
to call themselves Christians) and the people of the desert plains, who
were called savages by the self-styled Christians. And the savages, as
has been told, had the best of the fights. The whites occupied one
settlement on the Rio Negro, but only by favor of the red men. What
could a handful of Welshmen, unused to plains life and wholly ignorant
of savage warfare, do with such fierce warriors?

The time came, however, when the Welshmen were asking each other, "What
would we have done without the Indians?"

As said, it was in the last week of July, 1865, when the Welshmen first
saw the land where they intended to perpetuate their mother tongue in
its purity. July in Patagonia is the mid-winter month. A sailing ship
took them to the southeast corner of New Gulf, a nearly circular bay in
the coast, seven hundred miles southwest of Buenos Ayres. Here it put
them out on the gravelly beach, gave them some food and water, and then
sailed away. There were 150 souls all told. How utterly alone they were,
and how far away from civilization can be better appreciated when we
remember that in those days no merchant steamers had yet gone down the
coast to pass the Strait of Magellan, and that the only white men living
south of the struggling settlement on the Rio Negro were a disconsolate
gang of convicts, guarded by an equally forlorn squad of soldiers in a
stockade on the strait just mentioned. The Welshmen were separated from
all civilization, even the Argentine kind--a kind to which they were not
accustomed--by the stormy sea on one hand and by hundreds of miles of
desert on the other, a desert that was utterly impassable save by the
Indians, who alone, in those days, knew where the widely-separated
springs of fresh water were to be found.

Nor were their immediate surroundings any more cheerful than a
contemplation of the region that lay between them and the far-away
settlement on the Rio Negro.

They had landed on a pebbly beach near the foot of a low, white alluvial
cliff into which the elements had eaten holes large enough to be called
caves. Beyond the cliffs the arid desert, a mixture of sand and pebbles,
rose in sweeping undulations to a crest perhaps six miles away and four
hundred feet above the sea. They were walled in by desert ridges. There
was not a green thing in sight, but only ragged brown desert brush and
an occasional yellow, dry bunch of grass. There was neither house nor
hut for their reception or shelter, and, worse than all else, there was
neither stream nor pool nor spring of water fit to drink anywhere within
fifty-one miles. That was the kind of a country to which these 150
Welshmen came to plant a colony that should live by agriculture.

The Pilgrims who came to Plymouth Rock because they could not make the
world elsewhere worship according to the dictates of their consciences,
had a tolerably bleak time of it according to the orators on New England
Society days, but if one wants to hear stories of real hardships endured
by pioneers, let him go to Chubut and talk to one of the older Welshmen.

The first thing done was, of necessity, to dig a well for water. They
found water, and the well is still there. A drink from its depths will
carry a Yankee cowboy back to his old haunts on the plains of Southwest
Kansas and No Man's Land, instantly; that is, it will carry his thoughts
there. He will say "gypsum" or "alkali" with something verbally stronger
still, as soon as he gets his mouth empty. Indeed, one need not look
five minutes anywhere around New Gulf to find plenty of gypsum.
Nevertheless, the water would support life after a fashion, and the
Welshmen turned from the well to make shelters of the caves nature had
provided.

From the work of arranging their scanty household goods in the caves
these pioneers went forth, not to sow and plant, but to make a road.
They were in the region where they were to find homes, but the actual
home sites--the farms of 240 acres that were to be theirs--lay fifty-one
miles away over and beyond the crest of the desert amphitheatre within
which they had landed. They had to mark the trail lest they get lost,
clear it of brush and level its irregularities, and then they must needs
transport themselves and their belongings over it to the banks of the
Chubut River.

And all this they did to find at last that, save for a deposit of black
loam in parts of the valley of the stream, they had come to a land as
desolate as the shores of New Gulf. The desert walled them in. The wells
filled with alkali water. The north wind was like a blast from the
furnace in which Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego fell down, and almost
every wind came laden with a brown fog of sand. They had sought
isolation; they had found it with a vengeance.

Nevertheless, these Welshmen--and they were all miners, too, and not
farmers--began work to make homes and farms. They laid out a capital
city, which they named Rawson in honor of the Argentine Cabinet officer
who had interested himself in their behalf. It was a sorry capital then,
but duplicates of it can be found in the Texas Panhandle. It was a town
of dugouts and mud huts. There was no timber for houses. They planted
gardens. They looked the region over. They began to learn how to hunt
the guanaco and the ostrich that roamed over the desert.

And then came the Indians, the huge-framed Tehuelches, to whom the early
explorer of the region had given the name of Big Feet (Patagonians). It
was a notable day in the history of the settlement, but not a day of
bloodshed. The Tehuelches and the Welshmen became friends at once,
partly because the Indians, on learning why the whites had sought the
isolation, comprehended the matter in a way that made them feel a
brotherly regard for the intruders such as they had never felt for any
other whites. The Welshmen had come to find entire freedom in the
desert, and that was something the freeborn son of the desert could
appreciate.

That was an excellent beginning, but only a first victory. There were
many other foes on the desert. There were the panthers, the great, lean,
sly cats that are called also American lions. They swarmed on the
uplands and by night came to the settlement for the blood of horses,
cattle, and sheep. There were locusts in clouds that obscured the sun.
There were wild geese, ducks, and coots from the river--the winged pests
were in legions. It was a waterless region and uninhabitable for man
beyond the valley of the stream, but in the thorny brush of the desert
millions of nature's allies in her warfare against man found breeding
places.

For the first year the colony was to be supplied with provisions by the
Argentine Government. The contract was faithfully kept. The colonists
hoped to raise enough food for their own use after that, but their hopes
failed. The hot winds destroyed the few results of their labors which
birds and beasts had spared. Nevertheless, they held on for another
year, the government supplying their needs, although, meantime, more
colonists had come. Then came another failure of crops. The reader will
say it took a lot of pluck to hold on after that for another year. So it
did. These Welshmen were full of it. Not only for another year, but for
another, and another still--for six weary years those men fought the
gaunt wolf that stood at their doors. Then came prosperity, but with
leaden footsteps.

That the colonists did not perish absolutely of starvation was due first
to the persistent care of the Argentine Government. Uncle Sam was
counted generous when he gave to every immigrant 160 acres of land. The
Argentine Government not only gave these immigrants 240 acres of land
each, on the condition that they improve it somewhat and live there two
years, but it established a commissary department in the colony, and for
nearly ten years gave free of cost all supplies of food and clothing
needed to keep them alive, and as late as 1877, when crops had begun to
flourish well, still extended a generous helping hand. This was done in
spite of the fact that these Welshmen were avowedly clannish. They had
come to establish a Welsh colony, and had obtained permission in advance
not only to preserve their own language, but to govern themselves and to
live free of taxation. Under the terms of the original concession, they
were of value to the Argentine nation only in the fact that they were to
break up and cultivate so much wild land. They could not have been made
to fight for the land of their adoption even against an invading host of
Brazilian monarchists. No government was ever more generous to colonists
than the Argentine.

Goods were sent to Chubut by the ship load. But more than once the ship
went wrong, and the goods were lost. Then came the time of dire distress
when only their good friends the Tehuelches could save them. The
Welshmen were starving on several occasions when the Indians came down
the river and brought succor--guanaco, and ostrich, and panther meat in
abundance, with skins for clothing. As the corn of the Massachusetts
Indians saved the Pilgrim Fathers, so the meat of the Tehuelches saved
the Welshmen. But the Tehuelche Indians have not now to mourn, nor do
the Welshmen now hang their heads in shame at the mention of any King
Philip. White men made war on the Tehuelches and exterminated them, but
no Welshmen, though the colony was then self-supporting, took part in
that hateful enterprise, and when the red remnant were forced at last to
give up the fight, they came down to the Chubut River and surrendered to
the fair-dealing white men, who had called them brothers and meant what
they said. More pitiful still, when one brave old chief, wounded to
death, was breathing his last in Buenos Ayres, he smilingly looked about
him and said:

"I am going to the Welshman's heaven."

As said, for six years, the colonists struggled against failing hopes,
eating only the bitter bread of charity, struggled to maintain
themselves where they could perpetuate their language in its purity. In
1871 came the turn in the tide. A dam was built across the Chubut River
in that year, and an irrigating ditch taken out. Of course they did not
finish the canal in one year. It was a ditch thirty-six feet wide on
top, eighteen on the bottom, and six feet deep, and year by year they
lengthened it out. When the water kissed the warm, dark soil, it was
like the kiss of the maiden on the lips of the grateful beast in the
fairy story. The desert was transformed into a blooming garden.

And here is an interesting fact. For six years the colonists had eaten
no bread, save what was given to them. They would, therefore, get clear
of that evil first of all. They sowed wheat and barley, and they sow
little else to this day. Whatever may happen, the Chubut man will never
again have to ask for bread of anybody.

However, as said, progress was slow. The first ditch was not well
located, and when an unusual drought came the water of the river did not
reach the ditch, and the crop failed in spite of it. Then, too, there
were the wild pests at all times--the locusts and the wild fowl. Even
after eleven years of irrigation--in 1882--there was a failure from the
drought. But that set them to building a greater ditch, of which they
all now make boast.

About five hundred settlers came out in the early years of famine, but
the number dwindled to less than two hundred in 1871. In 1880 the result
of irrigation had swelled the number to eight hundred, and in 1885 there
were double that number. In 1880 the settlers were scattered along the
valley for about twenty-five miles from the mouth of the river, and
there was a sort of a village at each end of the settlement. The houses
were, as a rule, even then mere huts. Wagons, and carts, and horses were
had in sufficient number. In fact, the Government at Buenos Ayres had
provided all of these things. But the abundant harvests of 1880 and 1881
gave a boom to the settlement which the failure of 1882 only checked
temporarily. The colonists went up stream to a valley thirty miles long
beyond a narrow cañon and took up land there. It was there that the head
of the great new ditch was located. They have since gone to a third
still higher. They have, in fact, taken up all the available land for
seventy miles along the river. They have 270 miles of main irrigating
canals. The largest has a cross section measuring 75 × 9 × 36 feet, and
the whole 270 miles cost £180,000. There are 3250 people in the
settlement.

Some of the details of their condition from time to time remind one of
the Yankee frontier settlements. They began their religious life in the
colony with union services, and got on comfortably until they prospered.
Sectarians floated in on the waters of the irrigating ditch, so to
speak, and there was a burst of zeal in building up denominations that
brought a growth in church outfits quite equal to that in the area
planted--rather larger, in fact. Among the 2000 people of 1883 there
were two independent congregations with ordained ministers, who held
regular services in chapels, of which "the walls were baked brick, the
roofs were wooden, with a layer of mud on top, and the wooden benches
had good backs to them," as one of them described the places of worship.
They had also a stone-walled chapel in a third place, and held regular
services in school-houses in other places. The Methodists had a brick
church with an ordained minister, at Rawson, and held services in the
upper valley. The Baptists had a fine chapel at Frondrey, one of the
little villages that sprang up, and an ordained minister for it. In
fact, there were, in all, seven ordained ministers in the colony, and in
1884 the Episcopalians brought out the eighth. Every one of these had
his 240 acres of land, and every one worked his own farm and got rich,
as his neighbors did, raising wheat.

It is a significant fact that up to 1884 the colony did not have a
single physician. It scarcely needed one. Still some one was sure to
break a limb every two or three years, and the colonists were right glad
when, in 1885, a man with a diploma came there and took up the usual
allowance of land.

In 1883 a number of Welsh prospectors came from Australia to Chubut and
went as far back as the Andes. They found several croppings of lignite,
which at first were thought to be good coal, and that made a stir. The
stuff is now used for fuel to some extent in the houses, and it is to be
found that five tons will serve for about two tons of Welsh coal.

Then they found gold and went to work filing claims. The gold, however,
lies only thirty-one leagues from a port on the Chili coast where a
German steamer calls once a month, so that the diggings, which include
placer as well as quartz workings, will hardly benefit Chubut save as a
market for produce may be created. About $50,000 gold has been invested
in the workings. The Yankee traveller is sure to be informed, too, that
"a Texas cowboy named Marshall has a store at the camp, and he says the
diggings beat California."

Then it was observed that the desert plains above the upper parts of the
inhabited valley swarmed with guanacos as the desert plains of New
Mexico once swarmed with antelopes. Droves of from 5000 to 7000 were
seen. It was rightly argued that sheep could live where the guanaco did.
The Chubut colonists are going into the wool business, though slowly,
and this is certain to be the greatest source of wealth to the colonists
in the future. Bunch grass grows on the uplands. It is in scant
quantity, but it is there. Water flows through the valley. The man who
has water can hold all the sheep that can feed on the desert back of his
farm, and that means at least two thousand. Sheep thrive wonderfully in
the pure air and on the dry gravel of Patagonia. Everywhere along the
coast the shepherds boast that every sheep is worth a gold dollar a year
clear profit, besides the increase in the flock. But this statement
should not lead any one to go to Chubut to begin life, because all the
available land in the valley has been taken up.

Meantime, after irrigation brought crops, the subject of transportation
had agitated the colonists. The mouth of the Chubut River had an
impassable bar. Nearly all freight, previous to 1885, was either brought
to New Gulf and carted thence over the old trail to the valley, or else
was brought in tiny sailing vessels which, at the time, when the melting
snow on the head waters made a freshet in the river, could work in over
the bar. The surplus grain had to be shipped out in the same way. There
was a weary and an expensive haul by the one route; by the other, a
tedious and expensive waiting for high water. In 1885, a company was
formed to construct a railway from the valley to New Gulf, and the
Argentine Government granted a charter, and gave a subsidy of 204 square
miles of desert land. I guess the subsidy isn't worth much, for there
seems to be no way to get water on it. They even carry water from the
Chubut valley to supply all employees along the line, now, but a road of
a metre gauge was built, and a very good road it is, considering that
English stock and materials were used.

Building the road involved the making of two new town sites--one on the
gulf and one at the railroad terminus. That in the Chubut valley has
been built up, but half a dozen wood, iron, and mud huts are all that
can be found at Madryn, on the gulf. Still Madryn is an interesting
town. It has a ruler, appointed by the President of the republic. He is
called the Prefect. His district is a sub-prefect, and he is a sort of
an autocratic Mayor. Lieutenants in the navy get all such appointments
in Patagonia.

Madryn also has a Captain of the Port and a squad of sailors to help
preserve the dignity of the Prefect, and the Prefect has an assistant
Prefect, who ranks a little below the Captain of the Port. Outside of
the official group, but on excellent terms with it, is the railroad
group. This includes an agent, who is a well-educated Welshman, and a
telegraph operator, who is the charming daughter of the agent. To rank
with the non-commissioned officer and the Jack tars of the official
group there is a foreman and a gang of railroad trackmen. Then there are
two lighters afloat in the bay for the transfer of freight to and from
the Argentine naval transports, which come down from Buenos Ayres once
in three weeks. These lighters are excellent sea boats, instead of
having the models that lighters in New York have. One is a schooner and
the other is a sloop, and five men man the two.

The railroad has prospered moderately. It has 5000 tons of wheat to
carry from the colony every year, besides some small packages of ostrich
feathers, guanaco skins, and products of Indian workmanship. It carries
in dry goods, groceries, and hardware, and several passengers a month
pass over it each way. A train runs over the road every time a ship
comes to port--say once in three weeks. In fact, the company is going to
extend the line up the valley. The people living seventy miles above
the end of the road want better facilities for shipping their wheat, and
they are going to have them. This branch of the road will very likely
have a train once a week to accommodate local passenger traffic. In case
the gold mines develop half the wealth they are expected to, the
railroad will be carried right away up to the diggings.

Patagonia railroad building is not expensive. All Patagonia between
river valleys is everywhere ballasted with proper gravel for a road-bed,
and is so nearly level that the ties can be laid, as they were laid on
Texas lines years ago, right on the natural surface without turning a
shovelful of dirt. As compared with some Yankee railroads, the only
railroad in Patagonia is no great affair; but when compared with some
others it leaves them out of sight, because it pays dividends as well as
develops the country.

To sum it all up, here was a colony that might well have been called a
failure before the people reached their destination. It was called a
failure by about every impartial observer who visited it during the
first ten years of its existence. Nevertheless, in spite of the drought,
in spite of alkali, in spite of homesickness, in spite of all the myriad
drawbacks to which it was subject, it prospered at the last, and is now
worth millions sterling.

But alas for Dr. Michael Jones of Bala College! Alas for Mr. Lewis
Jones, now of the colony! They planted their hosts in the uttermost
parts of the earth that the shade of Prince Llewellyn might flourish and
his language be spoken in its original purity forever. So the shade did
flourish and the language was spoken for many years, but when prosperity
came there was an influx of other tongues, along with an Argentine
Governor and an official staff. Spanish was the language of the
Argentine, and was necessary for all official business. Under the
Argentine law every child born in the colony was a citizen of the
republic, and it was a republic of which even the descendants of Prince
Llewellyn did not need to be ashamed. The Welsh youngsters, indeed, have
grown up to look with pride to the broad blue and white stripes of the
flag under which they were born. They are children of the desert--and
they love that desert--love it so well that they never lose an
opportunity to speak in its favor; and they speak of it with the soft
vowels of the Castilian, rather than with the consonants of the Welsh.




CHAPTER IX.

BEASTS ODD AND WILD.


Let no sportsman or amateur naturalist be deterred from visiting
Patagonia by the discouraging words of Darwin. When that famous
naturalist had climbed the porphyry hills back of Port Desire, and,
gazing away over the brown mesa, had seen little worth mentioning even
by a naturalist save "here and there tufts of brown, wiry grass," and
"still more rarely some low, thorny bushes," he went back to his diary
in the cabin of his ship and wrote "the zoölogy of Patagonia is as
limited as its flora." If Patagonia be compared with some parts of the
tropics where the forests resound continually with the cries of birds
and animals, where butterflies and humming-birds fill the air, and the
insects are seen or felt in countless thousands, then, comparatively
speaking, the fauna is limited. And yet there were--and are--some forms
of life in Patagonia--insects, for instance--which, if Darwin had
happened along at the right time, would have made him think the country
about as full of life as it needed to be to keep a human being on the
jump. There are as many mosquitoes and punkies (gnats) in Patagonia as
in any game country I have seen in the two Americas, but the absence of
this sort of life at certain seasons is one of the advantages which it
offers to the sportsman, if not to the naturalist. For the hardy seeker
after the thrills of the chase, with incidental trophies, Patagonia
offers inducements quite the equal, all things considered, of any other
wild part of the earth.

Of the animals a sportsman could find there the first in point of
numbers is the guanaco. My first view of the guanaco was from the
companionway of the steamer in which I coasted the land. It was hanging
in the rigging about the mainmast. The ship's captain had been away on a
hunt, and had killed two, which were brought on board and hung up while
I was writing in my diary down below. I afterward saw guanacos cantering
over the hills unsuspicious of danger, and also fleeing toward a far
country because certain that danger was near. They were even seen from
the deck of the steamer as she ran down the coast. Although certain
settlements have driven these animals from three or four old-time
haunts, their number in Patagonia is like unto the number of antelope
that used to range over parts of the United States. They are seen by the
thousand.

In form and habits the guanaco is a very interesting beast. After a man
has hunted it a while he comes to think it a model of beauty and grace,
but at first view, even on the plains, it seems to the majority of
people ridiculous. "It is like a long-legged calf with a neck three
times too long," to quote the words of a Yankee sailor I found in Santa
Cruz. As a matter of fact it has the body of a goat, but it stands from
three to four feet high when full sized. The neck seems to be as long as
the body, while the legs, which are as long as those of a deer, are
really thicker, and seem thicker than they are, at least in winter,
because of the length of hair. The color of the body of the full-grown
beast is the red of a red cow, but the pelage is wool rather than hair
until the animal is well on in years. However, the pelage of the legs is
hair at all ages. In youth the wool is a light, almost a fawn color. At
all ages the color of the back shades into white on the belly, while in
extreme old age the guanacos are said to turn almost white all over. The
track of the guanaco is something like that of a deer, though much
larger, while the foot is peculiar in that it has at the under side a
very prominent cushion, which projects below the protecting, forked hoof
as the foot is lifted into the air, and which at all times probably
supports the main weight of the body, making the step very light on the
stony desert. The hoof is but a shell surrounding this bulbous cushion.
The cushion is covered with a rough but yielding skin, which, though
rough, is not calloused as the foot of a barefooted man comes to be.

When Darwin was in Patagonia he wrote some pages about the guanaco,
paying considerable attention to its swiftness, its peculiar shape,
which indicated that it was really the humpless camel of the South
American desert, and its curious cry when alarmed, the exact neigh of a
horse. But more interesting than all this was a habit which he believed
it had when about to die. Along the Rio Santa Cruz he found the ground
under the brush actually heaped up with the bones of the guanaco. Animal
after animal had crawled in under the brushy shrubs, and, lying down
upon the bones of others that had come there before it, had breathed its
last. He also noticed that when a guanaco was wounded by a bullet it
immediately headed for the river. The same habit was observed on the
Rio Gallegos, but in no other place than these two valleys.

With Darwin's words as a text, Mr. W. H. Hudson, whose _Naturalist in La
Plata_ is the most interesting work on natural history ever written, has
taken the trouble to reason out the cause for what he says "looks less
like an instinct of one of the inferior creatures than the superstitious
observance of human beings, who have knowledge of death and believe in a
continued existence after dissolution; of a tribe that in past times had
conceived the idea that the liberated spirit is only able to find its
way to its future abode by starting at death from the ancient dying
place of the tribe or family, and thence moving westward, or skyward, or
underground, or over the well-worn immemorial track, invisible to
material eyes."

With this uppermost in mind, I made haste on reaching Santa Cruz to ask
the gauchos and other citizens for horses and a guide to the nearest
guanaco cemetery, but they did not understand me. So I got Hudson's book
and showed them the picture of the dying guanaco, and translated as well
as small knowledge of Spanish would enable, his touching description of
the animal in the place of skulls. By and by they understood, and with
one voice said:

"It is not so."

"But the bushes and bones are there--thousands of skeletons."

"Without doubt."

"Why, then, do you say the guanaco does not go there to die, or to
escape an imaginary evil? Why does he go there?"

"It is very simple. We stand now in the lee of this house because the
wind is very cold. Almost one winter in three the wind is much
colder--there is a terrible winter. There is much snow, and ice over the
snow. Every place on the mesa is covered. To escape the cold storms the
guanacos seek the shelter of the bushes. The storm continues many days.
They can find no food; they cannot leave the shelter. So they die of
starvation, one lying over another. Every plainsman has seen a thousand
dead guanacos under the bushes after such a winter, not only here but in
the cordillera as well."

However, though the guanaco does not have a dying place, it has a lot of
characteristics sure to interest those who are lovers of natural
history. Like the North American buffalo, it has wallowing places. On
the plains of Patagonia, as on those of the Western States, great
saucer-shaped hollows are seen in which the guanaco lies down to roll in
the dust, but the Patagonian wallows are often much larger than any I
ever saw in Kansas or Texas. The gauchos say this is because the
guanacos resort to them in considerable herds--from thirty to one
hundred--and at night sleep in them standing, heads out, in a ring,
while the kids stand within the circle. This habit protects the young
from the wild-cats and foxes. The guanaco has no effective defence
against the assault of a panther save in flight. The old male guanaco
with a herd of females to defend will fight when a panther attacks him
unless the attack is immediately fatal. The canine teeth of the guanaco
make a bad wound, and it can kick like a mule, but the panther is so
quick and strong that the struggles of its victims are always hopeless.

In the right season each tough old male gathers a harem of from thirty
to fifty females, over which he presides in lordly fashion, and in one
respect the old fellow is a very good head of a family. He leads the
females into the hollows, where the grass is most abundant, while he
remains on the highest knoll of the vicinity keeping watch for the
enemy, and contenting himself by browsing on the scant herbage he finds
about him. At times, however, the guanacos live in vast herds, and then
all the older males remain on the higher knolls as sentinels. Their
sense of smell is very keen. It is well-nigh impossible to get within
half a mile of the sentinels by travelling down wind--some say they can
smell a party of hunters that is a full mile away, and even more up
wind. If approached carefully on the lee side one may get very close,
however, and then the action of the sentinels is something that makes
the gauchos laugh. The way the old bucks prance and jump stiff-legged
and paw the air and neigh horse-fashion is one of the funniest things
the plainsmen see.

But, like the antelope, the guanaco is full of curiosity. With a little
flag or even a handkerchief a man, after concealing himself on the lee
side of a herd, can toll them within pistol range by simply waving the
cloth in the air at brief intervals. It is likely that the animal
distinguishes colors, for the use of two or three flags of bright but
different colors excites them much more than one white flag will.

When a herd is fired at with a gun (something that happens rarely in
Patagonia) the report excites, but does not necessarily start the beasts
running. Indeed, the sight of the smoke may draw them toward the gun.
The wounded animal, if able to run, invariably plunges down the nearest
declivity, and in the mountains this sometimes means a drop of hundreds
of feet. If the animal is one of the leaders the whole herd with it will
follow, sheep fashion. A gaucho, who had guided an English hunter from
Punta Arenas up into the cordillera, said one shot of the Englishman's
rifle one day killed over a hundred guanacos in this way. They all
plunged over a lofty precipice. There was a camp of Indians in the
vicinity at the time, and the result of the shot made the white man a
very great medicine man in their estimation.

Guanacos can climb a mountain or run on a narrow ledge as well as a
goat. Though found on the sea-beach, they also feed clear up to the edge
of perpetual snow, and are quite at home in either locality. Their food
is grass and twigs, but they are not found in the woods, save only as
the natural parks along the foot-hills of the Andes might be called
woodlands. Even there they avoid going into the clumps of trees.

Guanacos, when taken young, are readily tamed, and for two or three
years, or until they get their full growth, make very pleasing pets.
They are fond of being caressed, are very playful, and will thrive on
any food suitable for sheep or cattle. But in the mating season, after
the third year, they become so vicious that it is dangerous for women
and children to keep them about. The females are then particularly
ill-tempered toward women. They show their dislike by jumping toward the
person that excites their anger and striking with all four feet at once.
They also spit to a distance of five feet an acrid substance at the
objectionable individual. If they knock one down, they will bite as well
as jump on him.

The flesh of a guanaco that is under three years of age is very good;
that of a yearling or under is delicious, and killed in the early fall,
it is fat and tender; to my taste the young are the equal of any
venison. The old ones are tough and rank. The Indians do not kill the
old ones unless driven to it by starvation, as during a long storm. To
the Indian, however, the guanaco is the mainstay of life. From the hide
of the full-grown animals he makes his tent, and from the skins of the
very young--preferably those of the unborn--with their silky fur he
manufactures the great blanket-like wraps that form his distinctive
dress. The skin of the hind legs is readily turned into an easy boot,
and the skin of the long neck is dressed and cut into strips which form
cords for the bolas, straps, and bridles, and horsegear generally--in
short, serves about all the uses of leather. In the sinews of the back
the squaws find excellent thread, and in the wool a material admirably
adapted to weaving blankets and filling mattresses and cushions. Nor is
that all, for the bones serve various uses, and the marrow is used in
place of vaseline, as well as eaten.

Judging by the good qualities of the skins I have seen, the hide of the
full-grown guanaco would make an excellent leather, well adapted for
valises and such uses, while that of the younger ones would serve
admirably for fine footwear and gloves. Skins bring from 25 to 50 cents
gold each in the market at Punta Arenas.

A curious kind of ball accumulates in the stomach of the guanaco. It
looks something like a stone, but can be readily broken. It is said to
possess medicinal qualities, and there is a ready market for the stuff
at the settlement.

Next to the guanaco in interest if not in utility is the panther of
Patagonia, the _felis concolor_ of the naturalist. Nowhere in the world
does the great tree-climbing cat reach greater size or accumulate more
fat than on the treeless deserts of the far south. Specimens from eight
to nine feet long over all are frequently seen. Though, perhaps, rather
lighter in color, they are in all other respects exactly like the
panthers of the United States. How it happened one cannot even guess,
but the panther is known very much better in the desert than in the
United States. Rarely can one read a story of the panther in the States
without seeing something about its terrible ferocity toward human
beings, while the stories of the panther that comes out of the woods to
play with the lonely wayfarer as a cat plays with a mouse, that it may
at last crush and eat him, are enough to make the flesh of the unlearned
reader creep on his bones. On the desert of Patagonia there are more
panthers in proportion to the area and the numbers of other kinds of
animals than in any other region of the world. The lonely wayfarer is
not often found there afoot, but men have been on the desert unmounted,
and the panthers have come to play around them, too. But it is not as a
predatory cat that they come. It is as a playful kitten. Individual
panthers play by themselves--old ones as well as young--by the hour.
They will chase and paw and roll an upturned bush, or a round rock, or
any moving thing, and lacking that will pretend to sneak up on unwary
game, crouching the while behind a bush, or rock for concealment, to
spring out at last and land on a hump of sand or a shadow. Then they
turn around and do the same thing over again.

When it is in this frame of mind if a lone human being comes along the
panther is as glad to see him as a petted cat to see its mistress. It
purrs and rolls over before him, and gallops from side to side, and
makes no end of kitten-like motions, and all because of the exuberance
of its youthful spirits. I know that the average reader, accustomed to
the Fenimore Cooper sort of novels, will think this an exaggeration, but
the plainsmen of all Argentina call the panther by a name that means
"the friend of man," and that too in spite of the havoc it makes among
their sheep.

This name, "the friend of man," applied to a beast elsewhere counted
ferocious, arose from an incident well authenticated in the history of
Buenos Ayres, though I have no doubt that other instances of the kindly
disposition of the panther toward the human race have served to
perpetuate the title. In 1536 the people of Buenos Ayres, then a town of
2000 inhabitants, were reduced to the point of starvation because of a
war with the Indians. One writer, Del Barco Centenera, asserts that 1800
of the 2000 died of hunger. The dead were buried only just beyond the
palisades, because of the danger from Indians, and in consequence many
beasts of prey came to feed on the thinly-covered bodies, a circumstance
that added greatly to the terror and distress of the people.
Nevertheless, hunger increased so much that many ventured out into woods
along the river seeking edible roots, and with some success. Among these
was a young woman named Maldonada, who, getting lost, was found and
carried away by the Indians. Some months later, peace having been
restored, Don Rui Diaz, the Captain of the soldiers, learned that
Señorita Maldonada was alive, and thereupon he persuaded the Indians to
restore her. He did this, not to relieve her from her slavery, but that
he might punish her for what he believed to be her treachery. He thought
she had deserted to the Indians, and so he condemned her to be tied to
a tree three miles from town and left there to be eaten by wild beasts.
This was done. After two nights and a day soldiers were sent to bring in
her bones for burial, but to their great astonishment she was found
unhurt. She said a panther had remained with her, and had driven off the
jaguars and other beasts of prey that came to destroy her. The following
sentence is from an old history of the town, and is given in the
original for the benefit of those who read Spanish because of a pun in
it.

     De esta manera quedó libre la que ofrecieron a las fieras; la cual
     mujer yo la conoci, y la llamaban la Maldonada, que mas bien se le
     podia llama la Biendonada; pues por esta suceso se ha de ver no
     haber merecido el castigo á que la ofrecieron.

Freely translated this means:

     In this manner she that was offered to the wild beasts remained
     free; the which, woman I knew and they called her Maldonada
     (ill-bestowed), whom they could better have called Biendonada
     (well-bestowed), since from this happening it was seen that she had
     not merited the punishment she had received.

The kindness of the panther does not protect him from the assault of
man, however. A war of extermination is everywhere waged against the
race. Mr. W. H. Greenwood, a sheep-owner whom I met at Santa Cruz, had
killed over 1000 panthers single handed, but in talking of the matter he
said panther killing could not be called sport. When started by horse or
dogs it runs with tremendous leaps a short distance. It gets tired out
quickly, and then leaps into the middle of the largest clump of thorn
brush at hand. There it sits up and snarls and looks like a fierce cat.
It will claw the life out of any dog it can get hold of very quickly,
but the moment a lasso drops over its neck it gives up, and lying down,
shed tears as if it knew and dreaded its fate. Panthers are knocked in
the head with the bolas, and even stabbed to death with knives by the
shepherds, though this last act is really dangerous. The panther will
not leap from its crouching place at a man, but if the man ventures in
reach the beast may claw his life out, and he may not, too.

As the sheep ranches spread over Patagonia, the panthers are killed off
as vermin. The flesh is freely eaten by everybody in Patagonia. Some
like it roasted best, but most people prefer it boiled. Roasted it
tastes like young pig. It is particularly esteemed because usually fat.
The Patagonia plainsmen, as well as the Indians, consume fat as an
Eskimo does. This is not because the weather is cold, as the arctic
explorer imagined, but because they live on a meat diet exclusively.
Vegetables supply the constituents to civilized folks which lean meat
lacks. The fat meat is sufficient of itself.

Of the hunting habits of the panther many stories are told, and from
these one learns that it is about the laziest hunter in the world as
well as the most playful. It creeps up slowly on the guanaco herds,
picks out a fat one, and then with quivering fur and flaming eyes it
leaps at its victim. Two mighty bounds, no more, no less, and it lands
on the back of the guanaco, and with a sweep of its right paw it
dislocates its victim's neck. Down the two go in a heap, and then the
panther tears open the neck of the guanaco and drinks the hot sweet
blood that gushes out. This done, the carcass is usually covered up with
brush, as if for future use, but as a matter of fact the condors or
other carrion birds usually pick the bones.

That, at least, is the story of a panther's attack when it is lucky.
Half the time the guanaco hears or smells its enemy in time to leap away
in safety. The panther never chases its game, even when it gets so close
as to tear bloody stripes in its flank.

At times the panther finds the herd feeding in the open, where no
shelter behind which it can reach its prey is to be had. Thereat the
wily panther lies down on its back behind a bush that may be afar off,
and claws the air, first with one paw, then with another, and then with
both. Up will come its hind legs next, or its tail will stand erect,
with the tip waving from side to side. These motions are something
guanaco curiosity cannot resist. The guanaco comes to the decoy by
starts and hesitating runs, but it comes, and so meets its death.

It is a fine savage, the panther. Shepherds told me of losing from forty
to one hundred and twenty sheep in a night, the mother with young cubs
being the most destructive--not that she may feed her young, but because
she is then most playful. She kills for fun. The guanaco is the
panther's staple food, but horses, sheep, and young cattle are all liked
by it. Indeed, no living being of the desert except man escapes its
appetite for murder, one may say, for it claws down the whirring
partridge as she springs from her nest, which it afterwards robs of its
eggs; it kills the ostrich as he sits on his nest, and then, after
hiding his body, it returns to the nest and eats the eggs with gusto; it
snatches the duck or the goose from its feeding place at the edge of a
lagoon; it crushes the shell of the waddling armadillo; it digs the
mouse from its nest in the grass; it stalks the desert prairie dog
(_Viscacha Lagostomus Trichodactylus_), and, dodging with easy motion
the fangs of the serpent, it turns to claw and strip out its life before
it can coil to strike again.

And yet, with all this, it makes a charming household pet. I never heard
of one being kept longer than three years, but none of those described
as pets was ever killed for personal harm done to or even ill-temper
shown toward a human being. The shepherds and gauchos agree that the
panther is always a kitten at heart, so far as man is concerned, but it
has an instinctive dislike for dogs and love for colts and lambs. These
failings, in spite of good training, will sooner or later get a panther
into trouble on the ranch, and then even the wife and children plead in
vain for its life.

If it be thought interesting that a tree-climbing cat like the panther
should flourish on the treeless plains of Patagonia, then it is
remarkable that two kinds of the colored man's choicest game, the
'possum, should thrive in the same locality. In regions where there
never was a tree, and never will be one naturally, the 'possum, with its
prehensile tail dragging uselessly behind it, lives as comfortably, and
makes just as good a roast, as ever it did where the pawpaws grow. That
it has lived thus for ages on the treeless mesa no one need doubt; but
when by chance one is transported from the plain to a region of trees,
to the valley of the Rio Negro, for instance, the old tree-climbing
instinct is found as strong as ever. A mother 'possum that had ten young
ones as large as rats, was once taken from her nest to a plantation with
trees, and straightway, without any hesitation, she climbed nimbly up,
carrying her family with her in the usual fashion--clinging all over her
back and sides. Nor had the use of her tail been forgotten.

So much for the ordinary 'possum. There is another sort found that is no
doubt indigenous, and it is of a kind to make the eyes of a colored
brother bulge with astonishment, for it is at maturity the size of a
small meadow mole. There are bushes on the desert large enough to serve
these little fellows as trees, and they are, therefore, able to follow
their instinctive desire to climb and hang head down by the tail, but
the spectacle of one of the little 'possum mothers climbing about a
desert bush with her tiny young clinging to her is one of the most
interesting sights in nature.

Another animal that is at least in one respect allied to the 'possum is
the coypu. It might, perhaps, be called an aquatic 'possum because of
its hairless tail and its habit of carrying its young on its back. The
naturalists, however, say it is more like the beaver than any other
North American beast, and it certainly has a remarkably beautiful
pelage. Its flesh is very good to eat, but it is chiefly hunted for the
fur. The feature of this animal, however, that at once attracts the
attention of a stranger is the location of the nipples of the mother on
her back instead of on her breast and belly, as in ordinary mammals.
When seen swimming about with her young on her back, as is her custom,
the nipples are found above the water line extending in a row from
shoulder to hip, where the young can nurse as they are carried along.

Of the weasels, one kind is described as much larger than those in the
United States. They travel in packs like wolves when hunting, and are
said to have the most malignant and devilish faces of any beast of the
desert. All birds and rodents that get within their grasp are torn to
pieces in savage fashion.

Along the Andes many Virginia deer are found, but it is only near the
forests. They emit a rank odor from the leg glands that is said to be
fatal to the desert snakes. The gray fox flourishes everywhere and grows
to a rather larger size than in the United States, but he is remarkable
for being very short-winded. At least, he is easily tired out. A race of
a few hundred yards with a desert horse uses him up, and he falls a
victim to the well-nigh unerring bolas of the plainsmen. He is not often
killed by the Indians, for he is not fit to eat, but the shepherds slay
him at sight because of the number of lambs he kills in the season.

Then there is the skunk, a counterpart in all respects of the skunk of
the States. Skunks are very numerous in all parts, and often serve the
Indians as food when larger game fails. It is an interesting fact, too,
that the Indians capture them when young and make pets of them. There is
rarely a collection of wigwams on the desert without a couple of tame
skunks playing about.

The skunks, when tame, seem in all respects inoffensive. The gauchos I
met when told that a skunk's bite is supposed in parts of the United
States to cause a malady akin to hydrophobia were incredulous. They had
never heard of such a thing.

Any reference to the animals of Patagonia that omitted the armadillo
would be noticeably defective. It is an animal with habits that must
interest an amateur naturalist greatly. There are two forms of the
armadillo. Roughly speaking, one is like a hairy guinea pig with a
pointed turtle shell over its back and head, while the other is like a
thick turtle without any breastplate. The former is very rare even in
its haunts on the Andes. The latter is everywhere abundant. As described
by all who have seen it, the latter will eat and get fat--very fat--on
anything from grass roots to decayed fish or cattle, from an ant to a
poisonous serpent, from strawberries to rats and mice. In the wilderness
it roams about by day because the cats of the desert persecute it most
at night. Near the settlements, where, by the way, it thrives best, it
is abroad at night, because man persecutes it in the day. Slow moving,
as it seems to be when the traveller sees it at sunset, it overtakes the
serpents of the region in a fair race, and kills them by squatting on
them and sawing its body to and fro so that the edges of its protective
shell cut the snake to pieces. It captures mice by sneaking on them
cat-fashion and throwing its body over them like a trap. It grubs for
worms; it robs nests of eggs and fledglings. Now, although it eats a
great many things that are repulsive to civilized tastes, the armadillo
is itself a most delicious article of food for any human taste,
civilized or uncivilized. In my journeys as a reporter of _The Sun_ I
have eaten nearly every kind of fish, flesh, and fowl served between
Ivigtut, Greenland, and Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, but found nothing
quite so much to my taste as an armadillo baked in the embers of an
out-door fire on the desert of Patagonia. Nor was my judgment in the
matter influenced by hunger, for my first armadillo was served
unexpectedly after a plentiful repast of good beef roasted on a spit. It
is said that armadillos are not found south of the Santa Cruz River.
They are indigenous north of it, but the river's current is an
impassable barrier to keep it from spreading south.

All travellers familiar with the desert regions of the United States are
at once struck on reaching Patagonia with the remarkable similarity
between the two countries. No one could object to the transplanting of
armadillos to the prairies and deserts of the United States. They prefer
animal food; they are good scavengers. They do no harm to crops, but on
the contrary aid materially in destroying insects and other crop
enemies. Indeed, they are so valuable in this respect that the
Agricultural Department, which imported bugs of one kind to destroy
others that were ruining California orange-growers, might well take into
consideration a proposition to import armadillos.

Space is lacking even for brief reference to other animals. There is one
thing, however, about the majority of all the desert animals that must
strike the traveller as the most remarkable thing in nature. The big
guanacos, the tiny rodent, half a dozen different kinds of mammals,
besides birds, all live without water. I do not know this to be true,
but every plainsman with whom I have talked said it was so. The panther,
of course, finds a substitute in the blood he drinks, but there are
others that do not have even a liquid food. They live on flesh or on the
herbs that are never noticeable for having juices in them. Still, the
matter is not without a parallel in the United States, for the prairie
dogs, the rabbits, and the reptiles of such regions as the Panhandle of
Texas and the Colorado Desert live in like fashion.

On the whole, Patagonia is one of the parts of the world for the hardy
lover of nature to see when he goes a-travelling. The zoölogy is,
indeed, about as scant, numerically, as the flora; but here, as in all
other things, there is a universal law of compensation. Whatever may be
lacking in the count of kinds is more than made up in the interesting
characteristics of those to be found there.




CHAPTER X.

BIRDS OF PATAGONIA.


All things save song considered, the ostrich is the most interesting
bird of Patagonia. There are really two kinds of ostriches in the
territory, one at the north and one at the south, but in the eyes of an
ordinary spectator they are all of one species.

The traveller will see them from the deck of the steamer as he
approaches shore. From a distance they look like a flock of overgrown
gray turkeys running around the desert. The angular gait of a turkey in
pursuit of a grasshopper is theirs. That the ostrich existed in the days
when sunny tropical skies hung over Patagonia is a fact well known to
paleontologists. There are ostrich bones in the old clay beds of the
region with those of the glyptodon and the monkey, but the monkey was
wholly extinguished in the cataclysms of the early ages, while the
ostrich, being better able to adapt himself to new conditions, survived,
and is even now almost holding his own in the fight for existence on the
desert, in spite of the onslaughts of the puma, the wild-cat, the fox,
and the still more ruthless hunters who have human blood in their
veins.

Just how it is that ostriches have survived can be understood by what
the Patagonians tell of them. Thus the birds feed on flies,
grasshoppers--about all the insects that appear in their region--and
they do this from the moment they break their way through their
egg-shells. They are able to make their own living from the first. Then,
too, they are brought into being in peculiar fashion. The old cock bird
has a harem of several hens, and he is in some respects a marvellously
good head of a family. He builds a nest for the harem, and the hens take
turns in depositing their eggs in it until it is full. Nests having
forty eggs in them are not uncommon. When the nest is full enough the
old cock takes possession, and sits on and cares for them until they are
hatched. Meantime the females go wandering about the plains having a
good time, and, incidentally, laying eggs where there is no nest--eggs
that are called "strays" by the gauchos, and remain fit to eat for many
weeks after they are dropped.

When the eggs are hatched the male looks after the brood--leads them
about where food is most abundant, and keeps his eyes open for the
ever-near dangers. Although the young birds do not at first recognize an
enemy in the predacious beasts and birds that surround them, the old
cock remains with them sounding "a loud snorting or rasping warning
call" whenever he sees a danger, until the youngsters know the dangers
for themselves--a very short time sufficing.

The habit which ostriches have of sticking their heads into the sand,
leaving the body exposed to danger, has often been mentioned in books
and used as an illustration of what a fool will do. But when one comes
to study the ostrich in its home on the desert the habit does not seem
at all foolish. Indeed, it is a wise provision of nature for the safety
of the bird in a region where hiding places are scarce. When a brood of
young ostriches is warned by their guardian they instantly fade out of
sight. Gauchos told me that they had surprised broods of more than a
score, of which they were able to find no more than three or four, and
yet those birds had no more shelter for hiding than was afforded by a
dozen or so of small bushes. Squatting motionless, with his head in the
sand, the ostrich is so near in color like the sand and the scant
herbage that grows there that even experienced hunters fail to see him.
His body looks like a gray desert bush--so much like it that a man may
look at without recognizing it. When looking for young ostriches the
gauchos examine every bush within many rods of the spot where a brood
disappears, and so find very often that what seemed to be a bush was
wholly or in part a young ostrich. With its head up, of course, the
ostrich would be at once detected. With its head in the sand it often
escapes even the keen-eyed fox, the gauchos say.

Ostriches readily learn the habits of their persecutors. When Patagonia
was first discovered by white men the aborigines were afoot, and the
ostriches, being hunted by men afoot, were accustomed to flee at the
sight of a man afoot. The Spaniards introduced horses on the pampas and
at first the ostriches were not greatly frightened by a man riding. Very
soon, however, they found the mounted man dangerous. For some hundreds
of years only mounted men pursued the ostriches, and they at last got to
a point where they did not fear a man on foot. Then came a great flood
of emigrants to Buenos Ayres--chiefly Englishmen and Italians, both
classes everywhere the avowed and open enemies of innocent bird life.
These took guns to slay the ostrich, and straightway a man afoot once
more became an object of terror, while the smell of powder smoke, it is
said, will set the pampa birds running away when the gun is at a
distance of two miles.

Further than that, a ranch owner is found here and there who will not
permit ostrich hunting on his grounds. The birds quickly learn where
they are safe and gather from surrounding districts in great bands,
leaving the hunted grounds bare. And what is more remarkable still, the
very birds that will flee for their lives when started by a man on the
hunted grounds will show not the least concern at the approach of a man
when they are on safe ground.

That they are readily domesticated may be inferred from this, and so
their plumes may be obtained without killing them. But not many are kept
so, because the old cocks are often ugly and will attack even men
accustomed to feed them.

Because the ostrich, though having wings, is unable to fly, it furnished
such sport on the desert as may rarely be found elsewhere. Consider the
healthful dash of the athletic young men and women when hunting on Long
Island. Remember the old time southern planter, when with thorough-breds
and yelping hounds he ran to death the long-winded red fox. And then
there are the races across the Colorado plains in chase of a coyote or
an antelope or a deer. The game is worth the struggle then, and the
struggle is worth--how can one estimate the value of such a mad chase?
It is simply glorious, but there is a race better still--the race for
the life of an old cock ostrich. With both wings drooping if he be at
the south, but with one up and spread like a great sail if he be at the
north, he stretches out his neck and flees away. The sportsman has no
need to urge a well-broken desert horse--it will turn into the hot trail
and stretch out in pursuit till the speed sends a gale whistling past
the ears of the rider and the dust from his heels lingers above the mesa
like the smoke from a flying express.

Nor is the thrill in the race alone, for there are pitfalls in the shape
of burrows where a misstep will send the rider flying sure enough, while
gullies and gulches with perpendicular walls lie here and there across
the trail. The bird with widespread wings will land in safety after a
jump over a precipice, but rider and horse must stop short on the brink
or plunge to certain death.

And when the bird is overtaken he is never shot to death. The sportsman
must loose the bolas from his waist, and, swinging them with whizzing
speed around his head, launch them forth at the right moment to tangle
the feet of the bird before it can dodge the blow. Men pay good prices
in the States to see a Capt. Brewer knock down a pigeon at thirty yards
with a scatter gun, and they probably get the worth of their money, but
what is the skill of a pigeon shooter compared with that of the man who
can strike a running ostrich with the bolas at a range of sixty yards?

Among the gauchos the chase of the ostrich is known as "the wild mirth
of the desert."

The ostrich can swim after a fashion, but the water in cold weather
numbs its legs until it is barely able to crawl out on the bank after
crossing a stream. The Indians take advantage of this and drive the
ostriches to water in cold weather.

Once upon a time a milk-white ostrich appeared among the gray birds
that roamed about to the south of Carmen de Patagones. Its conspicuous
color at once drew the Indians and gauchos after it, but for some reason
their attempts to kill it failed, and within a few days the belief that
it was the god of the ostriches was spread among the hunters, and
thereafter their superstitious fear of disaster made them avoid it
altogether. It was seen for some years, but the unsuperstitious panther
probably got it at last.

Both the eggs and the flesh of the ostrich are counted good eating, the
wings being the most approved part of the flesh.

Next in point of interest to the ostrich are the various kinds of wild
fowl. It is with a curious feeling that the traveller sees ducks singly
and in flocks come hastening toward his steamer on the Patagonian coast
instead of flying from it in wild alarm. A steamer passes each way along
that coast once in three or four weeks, but the curiosity of the ducks
is not satisfied by that, nor does such shooting as the steamer officers
do serve to frighten them to a noticeable extent. I have seen a flock
that had been driven away when one of its number had been shot return
again to hover above the spars, and so lose a second and even a third
individual.

Then, too, in the harbors flocks of ducks fly up and down and often
alight within easy gunshot of the landings, while a gunner in a boat can
have all the shooting he wants without the trouble of rigging up blinds
or using decoys. In fact to kill ducks was too easy when I was there.
The number of ducks seen was not prodigious. There was no wild celery or
wild rice for food along shore. It was, indeed, difficult to see what
they found to feed on about the harbors, but enough were there to keep
a shooter busy. This refers to the months of April and May, and the
people said it was the same the year round.

The best sport with a gun, however, is to be had with the geese. There
are two varieties, and both are quite numerous enough to satisfy any
one, even about the harbors. On the lakes--both salt and fresh--back in
the interior they are found really by the million, and so, too, are the
ducks. Around the harbors the geese frequented the low marshes and the
borders of the lagoons that were filled with water at high tide. No one
among the population had a decoy, and the birds were wild enough to get
up at very long range if a man approached them openly either on foot or
on horseback. They are much swifter on the wing than they seem to be,
and so a sportsman could find use for any grade of skill that he
possessed. On the other hand, the tenderfoot would not be obliged to go
away without a trophy. It is an open country, so that the birds can be
seen a long way off, but there are bushes enough behind which one may
creep within easy gunshot range.

As trophies the geese found in Patagonia are remarkably beautiful. The
Antarctic gander is snow white, with a bluish bill, while the female is
colored and mottled in a way that makes her little, if any, less
attractive to the eye than a North American wood duck. The ducks, on the
other hand, are not especially beautiful. The teal is about the
handsomest of the lot.

Black-necked swans are common enough, the bodies, save for the head and
neck, being entirely white. So, too, are swans that have black heads,
necks, backs and wings, with snow-white breasts. This is a most
beautiful bird, and when roasted gaucho fashion over an open fire is
said to be the best eating of any bird of the south end of the
continent.

The swans, geese, and ducks are all found on the lakes 7000 feet or more
above the sea, as well as on the seashore. The lakes form their favorite
breeding-places.

Another bird sure to interest the sportsman is the Patagonian prairie
chicken known as the tinamou. It lives on the most arid desert as well
as near the streams. There are two varieties. The larger one is known as
the rufous and the smaller one as the spotted tinamou. Both give as good
shooting, and are as good to eat as prairie chickens or quails, and as
game they are not materially different from their North American
cousins. But the spotted fellow has peculiarities. The cowboys, when a
flock is started, make a dash at the birds with yells and howls that
simply unnerve the game. The birds squat down and permit themselves to
be lifted up in the hands, and then, after a gasp or two, stretch out as
if dead. If in this case, however, the bird be released from the hand,
it springs away with a partridge-like whirr that is startling even to
the experienced. More curious still, when the number of charging gauchos
is enough to surround the flock, and the noise and excitement is in
consequence great, the birds are actually frightened to death. The
gauchos are a heartless lot as a class, and many birds that are only
simulating death are mutilated in the most cruel fashion.

We now come to the birds that are interesting to the naturalist as
distinguished from the sportsman, although the list of edible birds has
been by no means exhausted. Of these the gulls, cormorants, and penguins
will first attract the attention of the traveller. The Cape Horn pigeon,
a gull the size of a pigeon, is the most beautiful picture in black and
white I ever saw. It hovers about the ship in the most friendly fashion
and with never a quiver or flop of the wings sails right into the teeth
of the hardest gale--rising or sinking at will. But when caught in a
flaw of wind near a wave-crest it gives a few energetic wing beats, and
then is away again as easily as before.

The ability to sail directly into the wind with wings held extended and
without flopping, which all seagulls possess, can nowhere be more
readily studied than on the Patagonia coast.

Here, too, one sees the albatross, the largest of sea-birds. With its
gray and white plumage and a spread of wings of from eight to ten feet
(the sailors said specimens of fifteen feet spread were found), it is a
remarkable sight for the inexperienced traveller. Captain Cook, when
near Cape Horn, found the albatross made a very good meal, so that it
was preferred to any meat the crew of the _Endeavor_ had, but in modern
times the sailors believe that killing an albatross will bring disaster
to a ship, even more quickly than spilling salt brings bad luck to some
shore folks.

The penguin is interesting because it flies through the water as some
birds fly through the air. It beats the water with its muscular wings,
which, by the way, have only short and hair-like feathers on them. The
penguins are good to eat in spite of a fish diet, but are not sought
after by any one in Patagonia. In the Cape Horn region the Indians
pursue them eagerly.

Then for the Yankee traveller who is interested in bird life, there are
the shore birds that nest in the Arctic region, even in Greenland--but
at the call of the migrating instinct hurry away south when the northern
winter comes, to land at last on the desert shores of Patagonia. There
are at least thirteen varieties of shore birds that do this. That is a
most remarkable journey. There are other birds found in north Patagonia
in the winter time that go away south in the summer, but how far south
they go no one knows. When I was in the Beagle channel I made diligent
inquiry about the birds going away south, hoping to learn something to
indicate whether or not South American birds visit the unknown-regions
of the Antarctic continent, but the people down there had never been
interested in such subjects as bird migration. In fact, I am conscious
that such subjects as digging gold and raising sheep are of interest to
many more people in the United States than anything that can be said of
birds, unless it be the market value of bird skins.

However, there are some doings among Patagonia birds still to be
considered, because they are strange as well as beautiful. For instance,
there is a spurwinged lapwing that dances, what Spanish-Americans call a
serious dance, such a dance as a quadrille.

"The birds are so fond of it," says one who has seen the dance often,
"that they indulge in it all the year round, and at frequent intervals
during the day, also on moonlight nights. If a person watches any two
birds for some time--for they live in pairs--he will see another
lapwing, one of a neighboring couple, rise up and fly to them, leaving
his own mate to guard their chosen ground; and instead of resenting this
visit as an unwarranted intrusion on their domain, as they would
certainly resent the approach of almost any other bird, they welcome it
with notes and signs of pleasure. Advancing to the visitor, they place
themselves behind it; then all three, keeping step, begin a rapid march,
uttering resonant drumming notes in time with their movements, the
notes of the pair behind coming in a stream like a drum roll, while the
leader utters loud single notes at regular intervals. Then the march
ceases; the leader elevates his wings and stands erect and motionless,
still uttering loud notes, while the other two, with puffed out plumage
and standing exactly abreast, stoop forward and downward until their
beaks touch the ground, and, sinking their rhythmical voices to a
murmur, remain in this posture."

That ends the performance. One kind of the rails has a different
gathering. It is a long-legged bird, with a body as big as the ordinary
barnyard hen. These birds always have a dancing platform in the shape of
a smooth piece of ground, well concealed in the tall grass or reeds near
the water they frequent. The invitation for the dance is a loud cry
repeated three times in succession by one bird. They are a fun-loving
race, and instantly gather at their old resort when the call is heard.
The moment they reach the open ground they spread their wings, elevate
their heads, and open their mouths. Then, with vibrating wings and yells
as of lost spirits, they rush from side to side. From piercing shrieks
their voices descend to moans and cries that sound like human beings in
mortal pain, and then once more screams of anguish arise. It is the song
and dance of the rail, but the performance sounds like the voices of men
and women in the hands of demons.

The black-faced ibises mentioned by Darwin as a common species at Port
Desire have a most remarkable song and dance, so to speak, in mid-air.
As they fly along toward the roosting-place at sundown they will,
without warning, dash themselves toward the ground, twisting and
gyrating about in all directions, to rise again in like frenzied
fashion, while they scream in wild glee, albeit their voices are
anything but cheerful to a human being.

On the lagoons south of the Rio Gallegos is found a kind of a duck that
has a curious performance in the air, also. The birds in small flocks
rise to a great height and then divide into two lines, which alternately
separate and come together, while all whistle and call in the happiest
manner. As the two lines close up together they strike each other with
their wings with a sound something like the spatting of hands at a
minstrel jig. The performance may last an hour.

Let no one infer from what has been said here of songs and screams that
the desert is a noisy place. It is, on the contrary, distinctively the
silent land. One may ride all day and yet hear nothing but the beating
of the horse's feet and the brushing of his own feet against the bushes.
Even the fierce wind does not whistle or even sigh through the brush. In
this land the birds, save only the water fowl, are as a whole silent or
low-voiced. To one who has heard the constant and tremendous noises the
birds of the tropical forest make the contrast is something wonderful.

Of the other birds that the traveller may see a brief space must
suffice. Condors, with an eight-foot spread of wing, are common in the
Andean region, and are rather numerous at Port Desire and among the
rocks up the river there. The carancho is a great white-breasted bird,
that is something like an eagle and something like a buzzard; it is
everywhere abundant. Seated on the top of a bush on the gray-brown
expanse of the desert, it is a most conspicuous object to the eye. Both
condors and caranchos follow the panther, to feast on the game it slays
for fun. The shepherds say they watch these birds when hunting panthers,
and where a number of them gather somewhat excitedly, they invariably
find a panther hiding near the dead carcass of some animal. Both kinds
of birds, too, have the faculty of seeing when an animal of any kind is
from any cause so near to death as to be unable to defend itself, and so
gather to tear the unfortunate beast to pieces while yet alive. In the
old days, when Punta Arenas was a convict station, the prisoners often
escaped to the desert singly or in twos or threes. Hardy ones were known
to work their way at times to the Argentine with the aid of Indians or
even alone, but the majority fell by the way. Their fate was pitiful.
With the lack of food and the gnawing of thirst, their strength gave way
until they could but stagger on with faces to the north. And as they
staggered came shadows circling over the sand about them. Then the
shadows became substance in the form of black-winged condors and
white-crested vultures of fierce aspects and an eager hunger for living
human flesh. The unfortunate would rouse himself to shout and hurl
stones at this devilish host--for a time with success, but sooner or
later he would stumble and fall, and then they came and tore him to
pieces.

Remarkable as it must seem to the reader, parrots are found in the
forests of the Andes as far south as the heads of the Gallegos River.
They can be taught to talk, too, and are, in fact, very much like
tropical parrots in all respects. They exist in the Rio Negro region in
great flocks.

There is but one species of bird there, they say, that does not fear the
feathered cats of the air, and that is a species which one naturally
would not expect to find in Patagonia at all--the humming bird. It does
not seem to be a region of flowers and honey, as we commonly expect a
humming bird's resort to be, though it abounds in insects such as
humming birds like, but both flowers and honey are there, and so, too,
are several kinds of humming birds in the summer season.

As has been said, let the Yankee tourist who is a lover of nature visit
Patagonia, if only to see and study the birds. We Americans generally
ask when something is proposed for us to do whether it will pay. I am
not sure that even a Yankee could make money out of a tour through this
desert, but if any one has made his pile high enough so that he can
afford to go away and see some other part of the world, let him travel
out of the way--go to Patagonia and Punta Arenas instead of Paris.




CHAPTER XI.

SHEEP IN PATAGONIA.


At the port of Gallegos, I had a long conversation with Edelmiro Mayer,
Governor of the Patagonian territory of Santa Cruz. The greater part of
this talk was devoted to the sheep business, the one productive industry
of the region that now pays a profit to all having capital in it. Of the
stories that he told a few will serve as samples illustrating the growth
of the sheep business in this new country.

John Hamilton and James Saunders, British subjects, went to Patagonia in
1885, arriving there with, £500 each and a thorough knowledge of the
sheep business. They bought some land and rented some more from the
Government, and expended the rest of their money in a flock of sheep,
uniting their funds as partners. As time went on, and they were able to
sell wool, they invested their gains in more sheep and more land. In the
season of 1893 they sheared 42,000 sheep and were the owners of
fifty-eight square leagues of land, of which twenty leagues were paid
for in full, and the mortgage on the rest was in such shape as to give
them no uneasiness. By the estimate of Gov. Mayer the sale of the wool
from the 42,000 sheep in 1894 paid the owners just $42,000 gold clean
profit above all the expenses.

Another Englishman--I have lost his name--went to Patagonia in 1886 with
no capital save his knowledge of the sheep business and a good
reputation. Having abundant testimonials as to his character and
qualifications, he got sheep and the use of land on credit: a capitalist
was found to grub stake him, as the miners say. In 1893 this man sold
out his accumulations for £26,000, and with his wife and children went
back to England to live like a lord.

I saw a man at Gallegos who had gone there to work as a carpenter. He
did not have $10 when he arrived--in fact, he went there in the steerage
of one of the Government transports. He had been in Gallegos less than
three years, and he had a family to support out of his earnings
meantime. Nevertheless, he was the owner of 1000 sheep, of which two
thirds were ewes. In the ordinary course, as matters run, he will be a
man of independent income in five years.

There are three sailors in the country, who, within five years, were
wrecked on the coast and landed with nothing but the clothes on their
backs. They went to work on sheep ranches, and now have several thousand
sheep each.

"And how many men have gone into the sheep business and failed?" said I,
when Gov. Mayer had told of these things.

"Not one."

"Have any big companies tried it?"

"Yes, down on the Chili territory."

"Have any of them failed?"

"Not yet. On the contrary, all have paid big dividends, but, of course,
a company may be made to fail by its manager. The business in the hands
of individuals of moderate means is just now the best in the world. It
is better than 100 per cent."

"I should think everybody in Buenos Ayres, Valparaiso, London, and every
other money centre dealing with this region would be rushing into it,
then."

"The country is filling up rapidly, but of course capitalists are
generally shy of a business that offers such big dividends. Besides, one
must learn the sheep business if he would get rich at it, even here."

"How much land remains now for the capitalist to buy?"

"In Santa Cruz territory there are to be had 2500 square leagues of
strictly first-class land. It will carry more than 1000 sheep per
league, and it is held by the Government at from $2500 to $3000 gold per
league, according to location. You can find about 12,000 square leagues
more of fair land that can be had at prices considerably less. It would
perhaps prove a better investment in the long run. The territory has
about 12,000 leagues of worthless land--lava beds, etc., utterly
barren--almost too poor to support a guanaco.

"Of course, a very poor man cannot buy even a single league of good
land, and he doesn't need to buy. One ought to have some capital with
which to buy sheep, but the land can be rented for periods of, say, ten
years, subject to purchase at a stated price. If one can raise the money
for the sheep, the land need not trouble him. The rental of the best
land is but $20 gold, per year for a league."

"What is the cost of sheep now to a man who would invest?"

"From $2 to $2.50 gold per ewe. Rams cost from £2 each up to any price
you want to pay for fancy stock. The ordinary ram at £2 is the one to
buy now."

"Then, for a fair beginning, how much capital should a man have?"

"Five thousand dollars gold."

"But how did the sailors, with neither capital nor a knowledge of the
business, get on?"

"They accumulated both by hard work, and it still can be done readily.
The sheep owners are always glad to hire sober young men who are
ambitious to learn the business and willing to endure the incident
hardships. Their terms are not very attractive perhaps. The learner
signs a contract to work for four years. The first year he gets no wages
in cash. His food and shepherd's outfit are supplied, but he must clothe
himself. The next year he will receive from £2 to £3 per month, and the
last year from £4 to £5 a month, according to his ability. He must be a
first-class man to get £5, however. Meantime, if he has any capital, he
can keep as many sheep of his own as he wants, not to exceed 1000 to
begin with. These he may pasture on the owner's land and the owner
furnishes the rams to run with them. He may also keep the increase of
this flock of sheep on the owner's range, so that at the end of his four
years' apprenticeship he not only may have his experience, but he should
have not less than 7000 head of sheep. That, of course, is for the youth
with capital to start with. With no capital he would get on slowly, for
his wages will not buy many sheep."

"In the United States the presence of young men ambitious to become
owners of herds very often serves to deplete the holdings of those who
are capitalists," said I. "These young men sometimes gather calves that
do not belong to them and re-mark full-grown animals. Are you troubled
so in Patagonia?"

"Not yet. We have read about your rustlers, but have had no experience
with them, though sheep are more easily stolen than cattle."

"Are you ever troubled with drought?"

"Not in southern Patagonia. This country is really a desert, and yet it
is well watered; by which I mean that there are plenty of lakes and
springs south of the Gallegos, although the region between these waters
is either very like a shingle beach or a rock-strewn waste."

In Punta Arenas everybody seemed able and willing to talk about sheep.
Men who owned large herds were in all cases enthusiastic over the
present outlook of the business, but their figures were a trifle less
booming than those of Gov. Mayer. Thus one man who was manager for a
French company owning something over 100,000 sheep, with the necessary
horses, said that they made three francs on every head clear of all
expenses from the sale of wool alone. The increase of the lambs averaged
about 90 per cent. of the ewes, and this was an additional profit. When
told that estimates made up the coast called for 100 per cent. increase,
he replied that that could be had only where labor was abundant enough
to care for the lambs when first dropped. The lamb at birth does not
know anything--not even its own mother. Even on finding her by accident
it does not know where to get its natural nourishment, but is as likely
to suckle a lock of wool as the teat. Such helpless beings need great
care, though after a week or so they require no more attention. The
long-wooled varieties of sheep are in favor. The lowest average of wool
sheared is said to be 7 pounds per sheep. A printed table of statistics
which the manager carried showed that the average yield in 1889 in all
the Argentine was 4·4 pounds, while that of the United States was
exactly that of the lowest yield of his flock--7 pounds. His range was
considered poorer than the average, but it had sustained two sheep to
the hectare--one sheep on an acre and a quarter of the range.

The great difficulty that owners of large herds had in making profits,
he said, was in finding laborers competent to do the work.

The one disease to which Patagonia sheep are liable is the scab. This is
kept under by dipping them in various kinds of baths, the expense for
the bath running from $80 to $90 gold per year for every 1000 sheep. The
next greatest expense is for the killing of panthers. Every shepherd
carries a carbine, and must be supplied with all the cartridges he
wants. These rifles sell for less money in Punta Arenas stores than in
New York gun-shops, but the annual expense for rifles and cartridges on
some ranches is very great.

Foxes and a species of wild-cat make havoc with the young lambs, and so
these must be exterminated, too. What with hunting down vermin and
looking after the sheep to keep them on the range and to dip them for
the scab, the French manager had to employ a man for every 2500 sheep in
his flock. On the whole, his flocks, numbering a little over 100,000
sheep, cost the company 200,000 francs per year, while the sale of the
last clip yielded 500,000 francs, and the price was not high. In his
judgment, it would be a very poor business man who, after starting with
a good outfit and 1000 ewes on the Patagonia range, did not attain an
income of $20,000 gold a year at the end of ten years.

This being the most conservative estimate of the profits of
sheep-growing in Patagonia, the picture, as a whole, is certainly
enchanting. It will probably remind some readers of the days, something
like twenty years ago, when the profits of the cattle business in Texas,
New Mexico, Oklahoma, and other grass-and-water countries were setting
people wild. These readers saw great mansions built and furnished in a
style to make merchants smile and artists weep--built out of the profits
in cattle. They saw men go into the cattle business one day with no
capital but a broad-brimmed hat and the next, so to speak, saw them draw
certified checks for tens of thousands of dollars. Patagonia sheep are
now just where Texas cattle were when the owners began to reach out from
the green bottom lands of the Arkansas and the Platte, the San Augustine
plains of New Mexico, and the Rio Grande Valley of Colorado. It is not
in the nature of any business to pay 140 per cent. or more profit per
annum for any length of time. I do not doubt the figures of either the
manager of the French company or Gov. Mayer, but the conditions are now
of a kind that cannot last.

In connection with the profits of the sheep industry must be mentioned
the effect of rag money on the prosperity of the sheep owners. In both
Argentina and Chili the national money was at so great a discount when I
was there that a gold dollar would buy from $3.75 to $4 paper, according
to the fluctuations of the market. Because of this depressed condition
of the currency, both countries had about the cheapest labor to be found
anywhere. That is to say, when the currency was inflated and its
ability to purchase gold fell there was little, if any, increase in the
number of dollars paid to ranch hands per month. Now the sheep owner
sells and continues to sell his wool in Europe for gold. He exchanges as
much of this gold as he must for paper with which to pay his men; but
because the paper dollar has become worth only 27 or 28 cents in gold,
he can now pay off his men with less than one-third as much gold as was
formerly required. So far as food is concerned, the workmen are
unaffected, for they get nothing but meat and a ground root called
farina, with Paraguay tea to drink, but for their clothes they must pay
four times as much as formerly, because about all the cloth of the
region comes from Europe.

The homes and the home life of the sheep owners and sheep herders are
well worth describing in connection with what has been said of the great
profits the careful and industrious owners may make. I visited one of
the best ranches in the territory of Santa Cruz. It was located three
miles below Santa Cruz city, and was the property of two brothers of
English blood, born in the Falkland Islands. The Falklands being full of
sheep and no more land to be had there, these brothers took their
inheritance and went over to Patagonia. They selected their range when
choice could be made anywhere, and so got two valleys running into that
of the Santa Cruz. No matter how dry the season, therefore, they were
sure of grass for their flocks, and no matter how severe the blizzards
of winter, the sheep would find plenty of shelter under the hills and
steep banks and in the lee of the clumps of brush that grow on low
ground. The brush, too, was in sufficient quantity and of a size to
serve as fuel and for building corrals. It was as good a location as one
could ask for.

On the tongue of moderately high ground, where the two valleys united to
enter that of the Santa Cruz, they built their house. It was a mansion
for that country. The walls were of vertical boards battened with thin
strips, and the roof was of corrugated iron. This structure was divided
by wooden partitions into four comfortable rooms, of which two contained
two beds each, one was a general living room and kitchen combined, and
the fourth was a store-room. All but the last had good wooden floors.
There was a good wrought-iron cook-stove in the main room, and a table
and chairs that had come from a furniture factory. The beds, too, were
of factory make, and there were sheets as well as blankets on them.
There were a few photographs on the walls--portraits of relatives and
friends--and everywhere a profusion of grocery and tobacco-store
lithographs. All these things could be seen when the doors were closed,
because there were windows with glass in them, and the glass was kept
clean. There was a broom in the corner, and the floor showed that it was
used regularly. In short, here was a house that was neat and
comfortable.

I ate dinner with the brothers. We had mutton roasted over an out-door
fire--the best kind of roast--with fresh-baked bread, Yankee hard tack,
and coffee with granulated sugar and Yankee condensed milk in it.
Knowing something of ranch life as it is ordinarily found in Patagonia,
I said to one of the brothers:

"I do not believe there is a sheep man in Patagonia that lives more
comfortably than you."

"I fancy not," he said. "We have about everything that we want, and do
not mean to starve for the sake of saving sixpence extra."

Thereat an employee who had been a sailor, and had turned shepherd with
good success, rolled his eyes expressively toward a bright-colored
lithograph on the wall above the table. The lithograph was a picture of
a pretty girl leaning over a farm-yard gate in a way to show her
well-rounded form to advantage, while her skirts were so short that she
was at least in no danger of tripping on them when she walked. Jack's
gaze lingered on the fair form for a minute, and then he said:

"We have everything that the soul could long for, except society. You
can't get the kind of a wife you want to come to this country."

"I've heard," said I, "that the Tehuelche girls are pretty and
coquettish in their manners, and not at all averse to marrying stalwart
young white men."

"That's so," said Jack. "I know. I tried it. I gave an old buck six
horses for his daughter, and she was the prettiest one in the whole
tribe. We were married Tehuelche fashion. They killed and ate half the
horses I gave for her, and made a dance, and the medicine man shook his
rattles over us, and put charms around our necks to keep the devils off.
That was the swellest Patagonia wedding of the year, I'll lay five
pounds. So we set up housekeeping. Then the old buck, and the mother,
and the grandmother, and the sisters of the grandmother, and the
brothers and sisters of the buck and of the mother--Lord! the whole
tribe came to visit us. It took ten sheep or a horse a day to supply
them with grub. I stood it for a month, and then I got a divorce."

"That's an interesting incident. How did you manage the divorce
business?"

"Took my Winchester, and run the damned outfit to the other side of the
Cordilleras."

I saw half a dozen sheep men in Gallegos. They had come to the
settlement partly on business and partly for the pleasures of society.
With a dozen villagers they were seated at a large table in the
dining-room of one of the hotels. A huge kerosene lamp overhead afforded
fair light--enough at least to show that the crowd was unshaved,
unwashed, and squalid. Each man had a tumbler at his elbow. A fat, round
bottle that held about a gallon of claret was passed along at frequent
intervals to keep the tumblers full. All but one were drinking wine. The
exception was an Englishman, and he took whiskey. Half the crowd were
playing cards, and there were kernels of corn in little heaps as chips
before each player.

"This is a great game," said Mr. William Clark, formerly of Salem,
Mass., a ranchman, who acted as my guide. "You play it, eh? Of course
you do. Why, man, they've only corn for chips, but they are winning and
losing a hundred dollars and more every game."

"So? To judge from their dress they couldn't afford to lose fifty
cents."

"Of course they couldn't, but they're rich--most of them. Each red
kernel is a dollar chip, each white one twenty-five cents. This is a
great country."

"So it is. Is that old fellow with a ragged shirt at the head of the
table one of the rich ones?"

"You bet he is. Ragged, eh? Well, rather; but he's the proprietor of
this hotel, and owns ten thousand sheep besides."

"And the swarthy old pirate alongside with the big heap of reds--who's
he?"

"You call him a pirate? How did you find it out? That's just what he is.
He lent me a hundred not long ago, and charged me two per cent. a month.
He's the Government blacksmith. He only gets $30 a month, but he has
hundreds of dollars loaned out at two per cent. a month. Big pile of
reds, eh! You call him a pirate? That's just what he is."

On further inquiry I learned that three men playing at the table with
the landlord had incomes better than $2000 gold a year, while the rest
were employees on small wages paid in paper, the best-dressed man being
a servant on $20 a month. Four had been well educated and two could
barely read. Apparently they were all enjoying themselves, and I asked
Clark if they were. He looked at me in astonishment.

"Why, man, of course they are. What more could you want?" he said.

The sheep man does not want anything more.

Mention has been made of a man who sold out his holdings in Patagonia
for £26,000, and then went home to England to enjoy the proceeds of his
labor, only to find on arriving there that he was unable to enjoy
himself as he had expected to do. This family had lived in Patagonia
only a very few years, but the life in a mud hut, where there was not a
single restraint of civilization, had changed their habits and thoughts
so much that they were utterly out of place among their old friends. To
keep her house clean and herself was a burden for the wife, even when
she had servants to help her; to wash and shave, and wear a starched
collar, made life intolerable for the husband. The latent wild instinct
in both had asserted itself until it was beyond control, and they
returned with joy to the savage freedom of the desert.

And so it had happened to every sheep man living among his sheep that I
met or heard of, except the two brothers near Santa Cruz. That there
were other exceptions, I have no doubt, but they were mere exceptions.
The ranchmen of Patagonia are almost to a man educated and by their
youthful training refined. Some, as said, are university men, but, as a
class, they live lives, that, to people of culture and refinement, seem
utterly savage. They become so accustomed to this manner of life that
they will endure no other.

The desert is a strange region. It is forever bleak, barren, and
monotonous to the eye. With its piercing winds and blizzards on the one
hand, and its fierce heats and thirsty wastes on the other, it is
apparently the most inhospitable region in the world. But it takes hold
of the heartstrings of men, strips off their thin veneer of
civilization, teaches them joys of which they had heard only such faint
rumors as may come in dreams, and so holds them fast. "Such things were
and are in men; in all men; in us too."




CHAPTER XII.

THE GAUCHO AT HOME.


"We would rather hear the bird sing than the mouse squeak," is a common
saying of that most interesting class of men in South America known to
the world as gauchos, and it is the saying which, better than all others
originating with them, gives an insight into their character as a class.
To this may be added the book definition of their name. Gaucho, in the
Spanish-English lexicon, is a term in architecture "applied to uneven
superficies." The gaucho is the cowboy, the shepherd, and the plainsman
of the prairies and deserts that extend from the Rio Grande do Sul in
Brazil to the Andes and from the Grand Chaco forests of the Argentine to
the Strait of Magellan. He is an out-of-doors citizen of somewhat
"uneven superficies."

My first view of a gaucho was had on Flores Island, the quarantine
station of Uruguay, a place where nearly all the passengers bound on the
English steamers for the River Plate, during the yellow fever season,
are obliged to stop for disinfection and observation. We had been on the
island a little over a day when a steer was butchered to renew the fresh
meat supply. Nearly all the passengers went to see the beast suffer,
among the rest a Brazilian naval officer, en route to a station in the
Missiones. After a little time he came to my room, asked why I had not
been at the killing, and added:

[Illustration: GAUCHOS AT HOME.]

"It is now the best time to go. The killing was nothing--a gaucho put
his knife into his throat and it bled to death--but now the gauchos will
have an _asado_. Did you ever in your life see an _asado_? It is of the
finest of meat. They will roast the ribs of the cow by the fire."

Near the buildings set aside for the use of the third-class passengers
from Brazil we found a number of gauchos preparing to roast the ribs of
beef over a small open fire--a fire so small that the coals and ashes
occupied no more space on the ground than the ribs would have covered.
The rib piece was threaded, so to speak, on a slender but stiff bar of
steel five feet long. The bar was thrust into the ground so that the
beef was inclined like a shelter tent above the blazing fire, and there
it remained for about two hours, being turned occasionally by the
gauchos.

Although this was the first time I had seen beef roasted in just that
fashion, I was much more interested in the gauchos and certain other
things they did than in their roast of beef. Had the officer not told me
the men were gauchos I should very likely have mistaken them for
sailors. The Nantucket whaler, fresh from a three years' cruise in the
Pacific never showed a sweeter roll in his gait, than did these South
American cowboys as they fetched to alongside the fire or veered off in
search of fuel to keep it burning. Nor was the resemblance in the gait
alone, for every man of them wore a belt with a knife, the handle of
which was just where the man's hand would find it in the shortest time.
Then, too, the hats of the gauchos were of the nondescript sort, and
all worn easily on what a sailor would call the northwest corner or some
other corner of the head. The leg-gear, however, was by no means
nautical. Jack always loved flowing trousers, but not flowing as these
were. At first glance the gauchos seemed to have brown zouave trousers
with white leggings at the ankles, but a closer inspection showed that
they wore rather close-fitting cotton drawers in place of trousers, and
that in addition their legs were clothed from the ankles up with a
length--say three yards--of wide brown cotton goods. One end of this
piece of goods was tucked up through the belt and spread out across the
small of the back. Then the other end was brought up between the legs,
tucked up under the belt and spread out across the belly until its edges
touched or even overlapped the edges of the rear end. That is all there
was of it. The stuff bagged down between the legs in a fashion that made
the wearer the most ridiculous looking man, in my judgment, on the
continent. The nearest approach to it in North America can be found in
the trousers with flaps in front, which the good farm wife used to make
for her husband in the old days. It is true that the Yuma Indian of the
Colorado desert wears a short length of cloth in something after the
same fashion, but he draws the ends through the belt until they hang
down before and behind, leaving the middle to fit close to the body, in
which fashion he appears to be wearing a short skirt.

"What do they wear that cloth bagging between the legs for?" said I to
the Brazilian.

"You are to remember," he replied, "the gaucho lives on the plains where
no tailors find themselves in order to make clothes _à la mode_, eh! And
the gaucho cannot himself to make trousers and he cannot himself to put
what you call them--the patches over the holes in the trousers where he
sits in the saddle. But he can to buy cloth and to wear one end between
him and the saddle to-day and the other end to-morrow and another part
to-morrow--past to-morrow. Caramba! The cloth never can to wear out in
much time, but it can to cover the holes behind in his trousers. Is it
not true?"

Caramba is a Spanish word meaning in the American language "gosh." It is
in common use among South Americans of all classes, a fact worth
mentioning, perhaps, for the reason that the gauchos have no more
forcible word for use even under circumstances that would lead an
American cowboy into the most sulphurous depths of profanity.

Ridiculous as the gaucho appeared when seen on Flores Island surrounded
by houses and people dressed suitably for a summer stroll on Broadway,
he seemed a very different being when I came to meet him in Patagonia. A
hawk mounted on a smooth walnut perch in a city museum does not seem
quite the same bird that it does when it snatches a partridge from under
the jaws of a snarling fox on the edge of a thicket in the Adirondack
wilderness. To see the gaucho at his best, that is where he will be
found most interesting, one must go where he lives utterly free from all
restraint, even the restraint of association. Such a place is Patagonia.
This great southern desert gives perfect freedom to its roving sons. It
is a wondrous solitude. One rides away from the valley of the stream in
which he has left his ship, until the crest of a hill shuts out the view
of the water, and then finds himself alone utterly. Pebbles red and
brown, that have been rounded by the waves, with the gray and yellowish
sand of attrition, are under his feet. On every side are scattered
clumps of stiff, gaunt gray bushes. Further away the land rises in
knolls and ridges. Seeking for a change in the landscape, one rides to
the top of the highest crest in view, only to find that the ridges he
saw before had apparently moved on. At any rate, before him stand ridges
and knolls of precisely the shape he had looked at on first scaling the
mesa. Turning around and looking back, the ridges and knolls just seen
in front are found duplicated. One may ride for hours with never a
change in the landscape which the ordinary eye can detect. It is an
unvarying gray wilderness. It is as silent as it is desolate. The wind
blows strong in the face, but it does not whistle, neither does it make
a rustle in the bushes, unless it be a gale. The brush does not even
bend or sway under its impulse. It is, save to the most observant,
usually a lifeless desert. The faint chirp of a desert sparrow, called
by the Indians, mouse bird, because of its color and its habit of
running over the sand as it dodged behind a bush at the strange sight of
a human being, would not be heard by the ordinary traveller, and unless
the ostrich or the guanaco were stumbled upon by accident, no sign of
life would come to cheer either the ear or the eye.

Nevertheless, when once a man has learned the secrets of the desert and
its savage joys, he returns to it as to the arms of some fierce
sweetheart, finding there a spell, an elation that makes all other kinds
of life seem insipid. Nature has in store many undescribed and
undescribable pleasures for those who can return to live a natural life
in the wilderness.

It is in curious fashion that many of the gauchos of Patagonia have
gone to the wilderness to live on the bounties of nature, and it is a
curious life they lead there. A ship is driven ashore on the Patagonian
coast either by real accident or purposely, that her owners may collect
the insurance. Of her crew, should they escape, at least one will become
a gaucho. They will all reach one of the settlements, where a chance to
take service as sheep herders will be offered them. Several will enter
this service and so learn the simple arts of the plainsman--to ride a
mustang, to roast meat on the steel rod that leans above a fire of small
brush, to throw the lasso and the bolas, to hold the fur robe called a
quillango about the shoulders while galloping across the desert in the
teeth of a gale. The shepherd life seems good for a time, in spite of
the steady diet of mutton, with only an occasional change to guanaco
meat, the ribs of a panther, or the wings of an ostrich. By and by,
however, this life palls. Why should one be tied down to one spot when
the whole wilderness lies before him and nature will there supply every
want? Why should one take orders when he can follow his own free will?
Why mix in the quarrels and envying and strifes of the head station when
silence and safety and peace may be found beyond the range? The shepherd
becomes a wild gaucho.

And then there is the soldier stationed on the frontier. In the old days
he was like a break-water to stop the Indians who in waves came to whelm
the scattered settlements. Now there is peace, but the old forts are
still manned.

"So many officers are martinets," the soldiers will say, "and at best it
is a dog's life in the barracks. Let us be wolves instead." The soldier
turns gaucho, sometimes without waiting for the formality of a
discharge.

Last of all there is the lad who is growing to man's size in the
officers' quarters of a frontier post, or in the general store of the
frontier settlement. The desert calls to such boys every day as the sea
calls to the children on Nantucket beach. They have lassoes and bolas as
the Yankee boys have skates and baseballs. They are riding mustangs
before the New York boy is trusted on a tricycle. Meantime the gaucho is
ever before them with his swagger and dash, his hearty laugh, and his
quick anger. Mothers may frighten their children when babes in arms by
saying, "The gaucho will carry you off," and may tell the older boys
that the gaucho is the personification of all that is ribald--the
desperado of the plains--but as the leaders of the _courriers du bois_
of Canada were the sons of French gentlemen, so the chief men of the
gauchos are of what is called good family. I saw one of that kind--an
Englishman by birth. He wore on his shoulders a poncho--a small
squaw-made blanket with a hole in the middle through which he could
thrust his head. On his feet were potro boots, a sort of foot-gear made
of the skin of the legs of a colt. About his waist was a belt that
carried a knife, of which the handle was silver and the blood-stained
blade a foot long. He was unshaved, unwashed, and ungroomed. But he had
on a suit of fine silk underwear, "because, don't you know, I can't get
used to the beastly scratching of furs and flannels."

The outfit of the Patagonian gaucho is simple and not expensive. With
one good horse and three dogs he can start, but a swell gaucho may have
a score of horses and a dozen dogs. To these he must add a good saddle,
with numerous saddle-cloths, which are usually nothing but small
blankets woven by the Tehuelche squaws from guanaco hair and wool,
purchased or stolen at the ranches. Equally necessary are the
quillangos, the great fur robes made by sewing together the skins of
young guanacos. With two or three of these the gaucho can pass the night
comfortably in the lee of a bit of brush even when a blizzard is raging.
The water-proof canvas sleeping-bag lined with fur would be warmer and
lighter, but the gaucho will have none of it because his quillangos
serve as overcoats by day.

The weapons of the gaucho are simple, and with one exception
inexpensive. They are the lasso, the bolas, and the knife. The last,
having a carved silver handle, may cost as much as $25 gold. The lasso
is a horsehair rope. The bolas have been described by every writer who
has visited the River Plate, but it may be worth telling here that the
reader can make them for himself by taking either two or three round
balls of iron an inch and a quarter in diameter, or two or three round
stones of two and a quarter inches in diameter, and securing to each the
end of a stout cord three feet long. Then tie together the other ends of
the cords, making a good big knot in doing so. To use the bolas, grasp
this big knot and one of the bolas, and then after whirling the free
bola or bolas about the head to give them speed, hurl the whole outfit
at any target handy. If the novice does not crack his skull in his
earlier efforts to master the bolas, they quickly become an effective
weapon with a range of twenty yards. After considerable practice a
healthy man can achieve a range of thirty yards, while fifty or sixty
yards may be covered by the man of exceptional skill. The gauchos tell
of ranges up to 100 yards, with a two-ball outfit made of iron. It may
be so.

Having these weapons, the gaucho commonly scorns all others.

"I am astonished to learn that you do not carry a good revolver," said I
to a gaucho who talked English fluently.

"And I am astonished to hear people like yourself think one of any use
to us," he replied.

"But I have heard that you gentlemen of the plains have
misunderstandings with each other, and that you then fight to kill."

"It is true."

"Would not a good revolver be a handy thing to use in self-defence at
such a time?"

"It would indeed. To defend oneself--why, I suppose nothing could be
better for that. But we do not fight so. To think of shooting a man
when--Bah! Pardon me, my friend, but I can see you have never felt a
man's flesh give as you drove your steel home."

The story of the life of the half-wild gaucho on the desert is full of
adventure. The gaucho's day begins with the capture of a horse from his
herd. It is literally a capture, for the plains horse, no matter how
well trained, hates the draw of the cinch. Where a man travels alone one
of his herd must be securely staked out over night, that he may be able
to round up and load the rest, if there be loads. Sometimes the
precaution of staking is of no avail, for there are wild horses all over
Patagonia, and the joy of their lives is to stampede a tame herd,
especially a herd with mares in it. For this reason mares will sell for
a dollar or two each, where stallions or geldings of less strength are
sold for ten or more.

When the horses are packed and attended to, breakfast of coffee,
possibly, and cold meat left from the last repast will serve, but the
usual bill of fare is a cup of _maté_, the tea herb of Paraguay, and a
pipe of tobacco. The morning appetite of everybody in Spanish America
seems to be that of a man who has been on a spree the night before. Some
bitter bracing drink is all that is wanted. Then the _maté_ pot is slung
to the saddle, a last look is cast over the camp ground to see that
nothing is left, the finger tips touch the cinch to see that it is
tight, and then the gaucho swings into the saddle.

The gaucho born to the life is of the very best class of riders. Drunk
or sober, asleep or awake, over the smooth mesa or across the broken
ground of a gully, the gaucho sits in his saddle as easily, as securely,
and as comfortably as a New Yorker sits in a cross seat of an elevated
train car that has no other passengers. And yet the gaucho's seat is
apparently insecure, for his legs dangle about in a way that would be
simply shocking to a Central Park riding master, and one has to see the
gaucho's mustang jump sideways and land stiff-legged, while the gaucho's
legs are still dangling, and to see the look of absolute unconcern on
the gaucho's face when the mustang jumps so again and again, to
thoroughly appreciate him as a horseman.

The gaucho once mounted, where will he go and how will he pass the day?
One may as well ask the first question of an Indian or of a guanaco
feeding in a gully. He will go where the whim takes him and stop where
night finds him. He has absolutely no reason for taking thought for the
morrow, and he takes none. He will pass the day galloping easily across
the desert, in the main, with mad dashes this way and that as the dogs
start an ostrich. He will dismount to break the neck and disembowel the
bird when overtaken or when tangled up by the bolas. He will chase a
young guanaco, as well, and when an ostrich has started from under his
horse's feet, so to speak, as often happens at a certain period of the
season, he goes back on its track after killing it, because he knows it
was on a nest when started, and that in finding the eggs he will find a
delicacy of the desert.

The Patagonia ostrich egg is a huge affair, equal in weight to more than
half a dozen hen's eggs. The gaucho breaks a hole in one end to let the
steam escape, and then stands it in the ashes at the edge of the fire
and lets it roast. Of course, it must be turned occasionally. Because
these eggs are a hearty kind of food they are usually eaten at the
gaucho's evening dinner. And the gaucho dinner is a tremendous affair,
so far as quantity is concerned.

Having galloped over the plains all day, with, perhaps, a stop for
luncheon, a cup of _maté_, and a smoke at midday, the gaucho is hungry
when night comes. But, although he may have more meat than any three men
may eat, he will not have enough to satisfy his appetite. This is not
because the gaucho is a glutton, but because a meat diet does not fully
satisfy the demands of the human system. The Indians eat fungus of
various kinds, grass roots and seeds, and berries in the season. The
gaucho will gather the berries because they are everywhere abundant. He
will pick up a handy bit of fungus, but will not go out of his way to
find it. The bunch-grass seed is too small a matter for his
happy-go-lucky soul. So he is always hungry at night, and never
satisfied entirely unless, indeed, he chances to kill a good fat
panther. The fat of the young panther is the most satisfying food of the
desert. To tell just how many pounds of young panther meat a gaucho
will eat would be to throw a doubt over this whole narrative in the
minds of readers not posted on such matters.

However, with his guanaco, his ostrich, and his panther meat, with his
_maté_ cup after, and his pipe after that, the gaucho is contented, if
not entirely satisfied.

Out of the day's captures he will keep the skins of the ostrich, for the
feathers are worth 50 cents gold a pound in the settlements, and he
sells them that he may buy more _maté_, some more silver for decorating
his saddle, and some ribbons and candy to carry to a more or less
attractive squaw. The money left after the purchase of these necessaries
of life is used in buying a jag of the largest size obtainable with the
resources at command. That is to say the gaucho gets drunk whenever he
goes to a settlement. Getting drunk is the one civilized habit to which
he clings to the end of life. In all other respects the Patagonia gaucho
is a picturesque savage, the Arab of the Southern desert, who passes his
days in wandering from oasis to oasis.

These gauchos of Patagonia are only one species of a class. There are
gauchos, as has been intimated, on the cattle and sheep ranches. They
are much more frequently seen by travellers than are the Patagonians,
because they gather at the pampa railroad stations, and may even be
found in certain quarters of Buenos Ayres. They wear their
distinguishing dress everywhere, and so may be recognized readily. As
seen from a railroad train they look like slouching loafers. The
ordinary traveller see the gaucho at his worst. In fact, the gaucho has
seemed to be such a worthless dog to so many travellers, and so many
travellers have written and printed their impressions of the gaucho
that he has in these later years learned that all foreigners regard him
as a pretty hard citizen. Now, the gaucho is above all things a man of
pride, and even of vanity. He wants to appear well, especially before
strangers, and so it has come to pass that to call a gaucho a gaucho is
to insult him.

Strangers should always avoid insulting a gaucho until after they have
got the drop on him with right good guns. The gaucho is the handiest man
with a knife in the world, and his estimate of the value of human life
is as low as that held by any class of men.

"What does it matter? Many beautiful horses die," he will say when he
hears of the death of a friend.

"I was in a gaucho saloon up the river one day last summer," said a
Buenos Ayres man to me, "when a Frenchman looking for a ranch to buy
came in. He wanted to smoke and had cigarettes, but no matches. And what
was very much worse for him, he did not know the etiquette of the
occasion. With cigarettes in hand, he placed one in his mouth, and then
in politest terms asked the favor of a light from a gaucho who was
puffing a cigarette stub, possibly a little more than a quarter inch
long. So far he had done well. The gaucho said, 'with pleasure,' and the
Frenchman was soon puffing his cigarette. Then he made a well-nigh fatal
error. Instead of returning the worthless stub with thanks he dropped it
on the floor, intending, as he said afterwards, to ask the gaucho to do
him the favor of taking a fresh one. But he didn't have time enough to
even open his mouth. Dropping the stub was an insult. It implied that
the gaucho had been smoking a too short stub. Caramba! That Frenchman
was impaled on a twelve-inch blade before he knew what was to happen."

Not only is the gaucho written down as a desperado; he is called the
laziest of men, and in proof of this charge is cited the fact that he
will saddle a horse and ride half a mile rather than walk forty rods.
But the truth is that in his peculiar field he will work down any other
kind of man. Give him horses and set him to branding cattle. He will
begin his day's work by saddling the horse before the peep of the
longest day of the year, and then will drink a cup of coffee, mount, and
go to work. For seven hours he will gallop about the excited herd,
whirling and throwing the heavy rope, downing the cattle with marvellous
precision, and then out of the exuberance of his spirits gallop against
the stronger bulls as they flee from the hands of the marker to send
them rolling over and over in a cloud of dust. At the end of seven hours
or so he will want what he calls breakfast--a few pounds of boiled and
roasted meat will suffice, and if he have a couple of bullet-like loaves
of bread the size of his fist, known there as _galletas_, he counts it a
feast. This eaten, and a cigarette rolled, he mounts and continues the
work for seven hours more. And that is not an extraordinary day, either.
A ride of 100 miles in a day is not counted great by a gaucho, while
seventy-five miles a day for a week, during which three camps will be
made without food or water, is a matter of frequent occurrence. In
short, the gaucho does any work that anybody can do on a horse, and he
does it in a quantity and with a good humor that are astonishing.
Attending to cattle is not hard work in the sense that ditch digging is
hard, but a cowboy's life is not one of ease in either North or South
America.

The home life of the gaucho of the pampas can be duplicated on the
plains of New Mexico. The walls of his house are almost invariably
sun-dried blocks of mud, and the roof is a flat layer of mud over brush,
supported on the crooked trunks of willow trees usually found in the
valleys of streams. For the roof, a thatch of the long pampa grass is
also common. This is much better, because it is tight until it rots. The
mud roof leaks in time of rain so badly that the family moves out of
doors. Fact! The floor is the earth as the builder found it. There may
be two or three rooms, but one usually suffices. Here the gaucho and his
family, and his mother or his wife's mother, and a sister or two pass
their lives. A few skins of cattle and panthers and deer will serve for
a bed when a blanket has been thrown over them. A brazier may sometimes
be found, and on this water is boiled to make _maté_. The food--meat of
various kinds only--will be boiled and roasted over the open fire built
without or under a simple shelter in the wet season. There is often no
table, and chairs are scarce. The food, if served on a table, is simply
heaped up on a platter or dish of some kind, and each one makes a grab
at the heap. As often as otherwise each helps himself from the pot or
the roast as it hangs over the fire. One jabs his fork into a convenient
spot of the roast--forks are common on the pampas--and with a clever
stroke of his big sheath knife cuts off a slab of meat. One end of the
slab is flipped into the mouth when an upward stroke of the knife
divides the slab, leaving a fairly convenient piece in the mouth.
Watching a family of eight or ten--men, women, and children--squatting
around a fire, simultaneously flipping the ends of slabs of meat into
their mouths, and with upward strokes of keen-edged knives cutting away
the slabs and leaving the mouth full of the steaming roast, the whole
group talking and laughing continually, meantime--that is one of the
most interesting, if not the most pleasing, experiences of a journey in
the Argentine Republic. The traveller who visits a gaucho family must
needs join in the feast, following the fashion of his host, and it is a
fact that more than one tenderfoot has sliced off the tip of his nose in
an effort to cut off his mouthful of meat only.

In his social and home life the gaucho is, as one would expect from what
has been said, an affectionate husband and father for the most of the
time, with occasional outbursts of temper when he treats those dependent
on him with great cruelty. Dancing is the favorite amusement of the
sexes when together, and the gaucho is then--and at every opportunity,
in fact--a most persistent gallant, and a successful one, too.

Next to an intrigue, the gaucho loves to gamble with cards and play
billiards. He is altogether too excitable to make a gambler fit to
compete with the cold-blooded professional from the Rocky Mountain
mining camps, but he nevertheless acquires great skill in the
manipulation of a deck of cards, and he educates his eyes until he can
detect the slightest marks on the back of a card, and so recognize the
hand of an opponent. Indeed, cheating is counted as a mark of superior
skill in playing any game of cards. The gaucho would be greatly
astonished as well as angered if called a rascal for cheating.

At convenient distances across the pampas, and at every railway
station, will be found the gaucho saloons. They are mud-walled huts, of
course, but larger than the homes of the gauchos. The walls will be
found occupied with various Government ordinances relating to affairs in
the district, and especially to the sale of liquors. With these will be
great, crude lithographs, representing events in the last revolution, or
some other fighting scenes. Mingled with both ordinances and lithographs
are the tiny pictures that come with the packages of cigarettes on sale
everywhere. These cigarette pictures are of a sort to make a North
American, or even a North American manufacturer of cigarettes, gasp.
They contain illustrations of, and conversations between, men and women
that are almost always indecent, and invariably of a sort of wit that
makes the gaucho scream with laughter.

The pampa saloons sell but two kinds of drinks that are reasonably
pure--rum and beer. The beer is made in the suburb of Buenos
Ayres--Quilmes--and Quilmes beer is good. The native rum is consumed in
vast quantities by the gauchos, but it is not popular with ranch owners
simply because it is cheap. One would as soon expect to find Stock
Exchange brokers working the growler after a day's business as to see a
pampa ranch owner bring out a bottle of rum.

The liquor glasses of the pampa saloon are peculiar. They are water
tumblers in shape and outer dimensions, while the capacity is that of
New York whiskey glasses. The amount of glass in one will make it weigh
nearly half a pound. A more compact or better shaped missile for a
saloon fight would be hard to find.

Gaucho etiquette, as already intimated, is a matter demanding the
closest study of the stranger. That the gaucho is hospitable, and in his
way generous, need not be said. The stranger who enters a pampa saloon
will be asked to drink, without fail. If he wishes to drink he should
say so, and when he has swallowed his potion should ask the other fellow
to have something. But if he does not wish to drink he need not do so,
provided he knows how to refuse. The correct form of refusal is to say:

"Many thanks, sir; many thanks. I have had all that I wish to drink, but
will you not give me the pleasure of paying for the drinks for yourself
and the gentlemen, your friends?"

To this the gaucho will reply by declining with thanks, and the matter
is ended comfortably. It is an offence to decline bluntly to drink,
because in the gaucho's mind such a refusal could only come from one who
felt himself very much above the company assembled.

There is one kind of a drink, however, which no one should refuse
without first, as said in another case, getting the drop with a good gun
on the other fellow, and that drink is _maté_. The drinking of _maté_
among the gauchos, and among all Argentines for that matter, is like the
smoking of the calumet among North American Indians. A small gourd is
nearly filled with the powdered herb, and then boiling water is poured
in to fill the cup. This done, a silver tube with a strainer at the
bottom is poked into the decoction, and the drinker sucks the liquid up
through the tube. Now, as soon as the tea has been sucked out the
tea-maker fills the gourd once more with hot water, and passes it to the
next person in the group, and so on. The one gourd and the one tube
must serve for all the company. It will try the stomach of the
inexperienced traveller to take the tube into his mouth wet from the
lips of a drunken gaucho, but he had better do it with thanks and look
happy. It is better to put a vile tube in the mouth than to receive a
keen knife blade in the belly. And those are the horns of the dilemma
often presented to the man who interviews gauchos in their native
haunts. And of all things it is the worst insult possible to wipe off a
mouth-piece before taking it into the mouth.

Though ignorant of books, the gaucho is a keen observer of nature. He is
a thinker, bright, too, if not a deep one. His terms and sayings ought
to be gathered into a book for the instruction, as well as the amusement
of his fellow-man. He calls the chase of the ostrich the wild mirth of
the desert. The panther is "the friend of man," because it has been
known to defend men from the attack of the more vicious jaguar, and
because it often comes to purr about solitary travellers on the pampas,
as a tame cat might do. The rattlesnake, a species not known in
Patagonia, however, is the bell snake. The dragon fly is "the son of the
southwest gale," because that wind often brings clouds of these insects.
There is a huge and fierce spider on the hotter pampas that does not
hesitate to attack man--a most repulsive and fearsome being. The gauchos
have a weird song in which they tell of an army of these that came to
attack a city, and although the men of the town fought bravely, all were
routed and overwhelmed by the terrible foe.

They say that horses know an Indian camp by its smell when many leagues
down the wind from it, and are stampeded by the odor, because in the
old days the Indians were predatory. They say that pampa deer kill a
venomous snake by running around it and exhaling an odor from the leg
glands that eventually suffocates the reptile. Many people affect not to
believe any of this class of gaucho stories. But ever since there were
gauchos, they have been drying the stomachs of ostriches, and after
powdering the stuff have been taking it for disorders of the stomach,
while it is only within late years that pepsin has been on sale among
civilized people as a remedy for dyspepsia.

The worst feature, all things considered, of the character of the gaucho
is his cruelty to animals. Cattle herding or growing on the range is
naturally and inevitably blunting to the finer feelings of the herders.
In the States, as in the Argentine, it is made a cruel business by law.
The law provides that range cattle must be branded, and branding is
infamously cruel. From branding cattle to deliberately torturing them
for the pleasure of seeing their sufferings is but a step. I have known
an Oxford graduate to skin a fox alive--so great is the degrading
influence of cowboy life. But the gaucho does not become degraded in
this respect; he is born so. Of the gaucho's religion, a sentence will
suffice. He would be insulted were one to tell him he was not a
Christian--meaning a Catholic--but he has never heard of the Sermon on
the Mount, and is as incapable of appreciating its doctrines as is a
Yankee preacher who believes in the foreordained damnation of human
souls.

Compared with North American cowboys, we find that there are more rough
riders among the gauchos. They do not practise so many fancy tricks,
such as riding in quadrilles, but they can hang over the side of a
horse to escape a bullet, or still hang on to the horse when dead. They
know not the glories of a Stetson hat, with its band of gold braid, but
solid silver saddle horns and stirrups and plaitings on saddle flaps are
their delight. They have not that provident ambition which turns cowboys
into bankers and statesmen, but they have a hearty contempt for a
shallow pate, they hate a horse thief and lynch him with fierce glee,
and they despise the man who kills with a bullet as one who is a coward
and who misses the most ecstatic thrill of delight that comes to a man
hunter--the delight of feeling the thrust of the knife that cleaves the
victim's heart. They may be savages, but they are not animals. They
laugh and sing, dance and flirt, gamble and drink, race and fight, work
and endure, and so long as they do not lose their horses--so long, to
use their own figurative expression, as they do not lose their feet,
they never see a dull day and rarely feel a sorrow worth the mention.

Among the great variety of books in South America now accessible to
readers of English the majority refer in one way or another to the
Argentine Republic partly because it is a leading nation there, but
chiefly because Buenos Ayres is, as its people say, "the Athens of South
America." Nearly all these books have been written by Englishmen, and it
is to English writers that Americans commonly look with confidence for
information about many other things, and in many other matters, than
those of geography. Because of this tendency and trustfulness of
American readers I think I cannot do better, in concluding this sketch
of Argentine gauchos, than to quote a sentence from a work entitled
_Argentine, Patagonian, and Chilian Sketches_, by Mr. C. E. Akers. He
says (page 115): "The native gaucho, too, is not a very highly
interesting individual."




CHAPTER XIII.

PATAGONIA'S TRAMPS.


A number of surprises await the traveller who visits Patagonia, but
probably none is greater than the sight of the tramps sure to be found
at almost every port. There is nothing especially surprising in the
quality or grade of the tramps; they are the same uncleanly loafers that
offend the eye on the highways of the United States, but to find them on
the desert and tramping from place to place, that is remarkable.

For, consider what Patagonia between the Rio Negro and the Strait of
Magellan is as a place of human residence. The settlements are hundreds
of miles apart. One who rides from place to place cannot travel in a
straight line, but must go hither and yon to reach the springs of sweet
water, and even then, in many places, the known springs are from 100 to
130 miles apart. In very many parts of the desert, only the best horses
and men can stand the terrors of thirst and heat by day and of thirst
and cold by night.

Worse yet, it is for the most part a trackless desert. No wagons are
used, and the hoofs of the unshod horses that are occasionally taken
over the route do not leave a trail that any one can follow.
Nevertheless, in spite of all this--in spite even of the fierce storms
of sleet and hail--tramps are to be found at about every settlement, and
in some way they get on from place to place, seeing the country in true
tramp fashion, and living on the food and wearing the cast-off clothing
and drinking the liquor they beg from the more or less industrious
people found in the region. I say more or less industrious people
advisedly, for the reason that tramps are found not only among the
ranches of the energetic sheep farmers, but also in the wigwams of the
Indians.

I got my first view of a Patagonian tramp at the first Patagonian port I
entered--Madryn, on the shore of New Gulf. The Captain of the Port had a
United States wife, and, on learning my nationality, made me at home at
his house. While I was in the parlor talking to a number of people a man
came to the open door and knocked. The Captain's wife came to the
Captain and said:

"There is that vagabond again." Then she asked me if I had expected to
find tramps like the Yankee article in Patagonia. I followed the Captain
out in order to see the fellow, and found a man with unkempt red hair
under a badly worn soft hat, a face that was of a pinkish red color and
blotched with big freckles, a thin, sandy moustache, and thin, sandy
beard, a coat and trousers but no shirt or socks, and a pair of shoes
that were almost devoid of soles. In the presence of the official he was
meek and deprecatory. He wanted to make an explanation, but the official
would not listen. A naval sailor was called and ordered to put the tramp
into a lockup. Thereat the tramp brightened up greatly, and walked away
talking cheerfully in very bad Spanish to the sailor.

Then I learned something about the tramp. He had appeared at Madryn some
weeks before that, saying he had come from Buenos Ayres on a ship. He
was looking for work, too. Still no ship was then in from Buenos Ayres,
and when ranch work was offered to him he said that it was a kind of
work that he could not do. He loafed about Madryn, sleeping in the lee
of one house or another, and begging food first of the few families
there and then of the seamen who helped to keep up the dignity of the
Government establishments. When people began to treat him coolly he
wanted some one to take him to a little settlement sixteen miles away
along the shore of the gulf. No one would do it, so he started away
afoot. He had just returned from that settlement when I saw him.

"What will you do with him?" I asked.

"Give him some breakfast."

"And then?"

"He will have dinner. In the morning, after coffee, he must go."

There was but one route for him to travel--the little railroad that led
to the Welsh colony of Chubut. It was a route fifty-one miles long and
without water, but no one doubted that he would walk it without trouble.
I guess he didn't walk it, however. The one train of this road came to
town next day. I saw the tramp standing beside it while the crew were
busy with their work. There were in the train some open box cars, and
some that could be easily opened. While I was looking at the crew the
tramp disappeared and I saw no more of him, although I was in Madryn two
days longer. I think he beat his way to the colony in a freight car,
tramp fashion. The Welsh colony is sixty miles long and has some
thousands of inhabitants, all of whom were once poor, but have now at
least enough to eat and to wear. They remember when they were poor, and
they will give food and cast-off clothes even to this vagabond.

Still there was a mystery about the fellow. I wanted to learn how he got
to Madryn in the first place, but all that he would say was that he had
come in a ship, which was obviously untrue, unless he had come from some
small sailing vessel beating along the coast. But that seems an
impossible explanation of the matter, and the mystery remains.

When in the course of time I reached Rio Santa Cruz and went ashore I
found a drowsy-looking white man sitting on the beach talking to a
native Argentine of mixed blood. The white man, though somewhat sleepy,
was indignant, to judge by his expressions and accent. Seeing me he
stopped his flow of profanity for a moment, and then said:

"Beg pardon, s-s-stranger. Are you English?"

"No, I'm a Yankee," said I.

"Glad to--hic--hear it. That's whi'-whi' man's country. S-s-see tha'
ship?" (Pointing to a brigantine anchored in the stream.) "S-she's
English. S-so 'm I. T'--hic--t' 'ell with her. I'm one of her crew. Th'
Captain lef' me--hic--here becau' drunk. S-s-said this bes' place for
me; going t' leave me here."

"Oh, I guess not. He's got to carry you back to London, or wherever the
ship cleared from."

"Lonnon be damned. I'm from S-s-sandy Point. Wish t'--hic--'ell I was
there now. Tha' 's God's country, eh? 'F 'e don' take me 'board to-ni',
going walk S-s-sandy Point surer 'n fate."

Finding conversation with the sailor growing more difficult with each
sentence, I asked the Argentine man about him, and learned that he was
originally one of a crew of a ship wrecked on the coast of Tierra del
Fuego several years ago. The crew had in some way reached Punta Arenas,
or Sandy Point, as the English call it, in the Strait of Magellan, where
most of them had found life so pleasant that they could not tear
themselves away for any length of time. This man had been sailing in the
fleet of little traders that have Punta Arenas for headquarters, but had
signed articles on the brigantine, and was in duty bound to return in
her to England. She had come into the Rio Santa Cruz for a cargo of
wool, and was then well-nigh loaded. The men, of course, had been
obliged to come ashore for the wool with small boats, and as a result
this man had been able to get drunk. He had been worthless as a foremast
hand, and so the skipper had taken advantage of his drunkenness to get
rid of him.

"Well, will he walk to Punta Arenas?" said I.

"Y' are dam' ri' I will," interrupted the sailor.

"Who knows?" said the native, with a shrug of his shoulders. "Many of
them try it, as he will. Not many arrive there."

The last I saw of this fellow was on the evening of my last day in Santa
Cruz. He was curling down to sleep on the lee side of a bunch of bushes.
He was rather drunker than when I first saw him. He had been drunk every
day while I was in port, and this, too, though penniless.

Down at the Rio Gallegos I found two more English-speaking tramps. Both
claimed Punta Arenas as their home, and both spoke of it as the chief
centre of the world's delights. Both were miners, they said, and they
had come from the low-tide diggings a few leagues down the beach. Both
had been sailors at one time and shepherds at another, and both were
about as worthless as any vagabonds I ever saw. They were there during
all the time of my stay, and they took pains to speak to me at every
opportunity. They said each day they were going to start the next day
for the strait colony, but I guess they remained where they were until
the authorities forced them away.

That the tramps were numerous enough at Gallegos to be considered a
public nuisance was evident from the fact that copies of a tramp
ordinance were posted conspicuously in the bar-rooms. This provided that
all persons found within the town limits who were without occupation or
employment or means of support, and any one found begging should be
arrested by the police, and on conviction before the Justice set to work
"on any public improvements that the magistrate may direct for not more
than two months."

I called the attention of one of the tramps I met to this ordinance.

"I twigged it the first day," he said. "I haven't done much but lie
around and twig things since I came, but I've got an occupation. Yes,
sir, I'm a miner, and I'm here to buy horses for the outfit down the
beach. Just as soon as I can get a herd of $50 horses together at $20
each I shall cut this town dead."

Inquiry at the various ports showed that professional tramping in
Patagonia had developed from a variety of causes. In the north the
old-time professional loafers simply extended their journey from the
capital city to the Rio Negro. It seems that cattle and sheep breeding
have in some way a strong tendency to make men over-hospitable. On the
pampas of the Argentine, in the sheep stations of Australia, and among
the ranches of the American prairies the wayfarer is not only welcome,
but is made to feel that he is so. In the United States the abuse of
this hospitality has pretty well destroyed its old-time heartiness. The
Yankee ranchman now wants to know the character of his guests before
making them welcome. In the Argentine known loafers are invited in. Men
are found there who own horses and ride about from ranch to ranch, never
doing a stroke of work from one year to another, and yet are made
welcome at a single ranch table for weeks and months at a stretch. I
have never heard of such a custom elsewhere, except in Australia. These
pampa vagabonds have extended their routes to the Rio Negro ranches
since the destruction of the Indians made it possible to settle the Rio
Negro valley.

Next came the tramp element to the Welsh colony at Chubut. These
Welshmen were supported absolutely for six years, and in part for ten or
more by the Government. As a rule, the Welsh were of too sturdy a make
to be injured by the charity, but some were overcome by it. They learned
the desert routes from the Indians. They even strolled away with
wandering bands of Tehuelches and became desert nomads.

Then, when the Welsh had prospered and were able to employ laborers on
their farms, there were disagreements between masters and men, which
ended in the men going away, anywhere to get clear of the hated
employer.

When I was at Gallegos I fell in with William Clark, formerly of Salem,
Mass., of whom mention has been made, who owned a fine ranch up the
river. Clark had only two days before left his ranch to come to town,
and the first thing he told me was that he had been entertaining a
citizen of the United States who had come along on afoot without a cent
of money and scant clothing. The man had been employed on a ranch by one
whom Clark knew to be a hard master, and had left because of
ill-treatment, going away without taking his own clothes. Clark was
indignant at the treatment the Yankee had received, and not only fitted
him out comfortably, but gave him a good lift on his way towards the
more settled region to the south. Very likely this Yankee wayfarer was a
reputable man, but Clark admitted that vagabonds were becoming
numerous--men who told stories of ill-treatment at some ranch afar off
to gain the sympathy of the impulsive ranchman to whom he was talking.

In connection with the tramp of Patagonia must be mentioned the white
men, who for more than fifty years have made their homes among the
desert Indians for varying lengths of time. The Tehuelches learned a
long time ago that white men, and especially white sailors, were skilful
in a variety of arts useful to the Indians, and moreover that they
almost invariably carried knives and other useful or ornamental things
in their pockets. Whenever a ship came to anchor in the Strait of
Magellan in former years the Indians came down to the beach to welcome
the crew ashore. First of all, there was the trading of furs and
feathers for rum, tobacco, and tools, and the last of all, was the
coaxing of some of the crew to desert the ship. The Indians were wily.
They told the sailorman that he was so skilful in his arts he should be
made a chief, and so become entitled to a fine wigwam, many horses, and
all the wives he wanted. Jack's bosom heaved with joy at the bare
thought of such luxuries, and when opportunity offered he gathered as
much plunder as possible from the vessel and fled to the Indians.

Then he found he had made the mistake of his life. He was not only
robbed of all his plunder, but in every case was stripped of all his
clothing except a shirt or a thin coat, a pair of trousers and possibly
a pair of shoes. In many cases the shoes were taken also, leaving the
poor devil to walk barefooted over the stony desert. Instead of becoming
a chief he was made a slave, who had to gather fuel and to do other work
beneath the dignity of the lordly Tehuelche. He had to walk when the
camp was moved, and, what was worse than all else--it simply broke
Jack's heart entirely--instead of having many pretty Indian girls for
wives, he became "the white fool," the butt of the entire band down to
the smallest youngster. Neither guile nor bravado nor real bravery ever
availed to make Jack a chief, though cases are known where a man of good
natural abilities did work out the condition of a slave to that of a
warrior. The lives these men led were of the greatest hardship on
account of the severity of the climate and their lack of clothing, so
that many died from exposure. Others were killed in quarrels, and the
happiest fate that could befall the runaway was to be carried back to
his Captain and delivered up for a ransom, that he might receive the
punishment he deserved when he stole from the ship and his comrades. The
Rev. Titus Coan, the Yankee missionary who went to Patagonia, but
concluded that the Arab-like life of the Tehuelches was unsuited to
Yankee missionary tastes, found runaway sailors among the Tehuelches.
That was in 1833. I did not see any of them when in Patagonia, but the
gauchos told about them, and I have no doubt they are to be found there
now.

It is common for people of New York who have accumulated enough money to
enable them to retire from business to speak of themselves as "living in
independent circumstances." They can live without work. These tramps are
also in independent circumstances. They can live without work. It was
written, that if a man will not work neither shall he eat. We now find
ourselves obliged to modify the old-time interpretation of this
scripture. I do not pretend to offer any suggestion in the matter of
relieving the toilers from the incubus of the loafers but those who are
engaged in solving the problem, ought to know and to consider the fact
that in desert Patagonia the number of tramps is greater in proportion
to the population than it is in the well-settled parts of the United
States.




CHAPTER XIV.

THE JOURNEY ALONG-SHORE.


It was in the month of April--and that is to say in the fall of the
year--that I started on my voyage in the wake of the old-time explorers
Magellan, Wallis, Cook, Bougainville, and the others whose names are
associated with the Cape Horn region. I had passed the previous summer
in the fever-laden atmosphere of Rio Janeiro--had sweltered and fumed
under torrid heats and breathed the odors from the streets that are too
vile for description until the thoughts of ice floes and of the sweet
breath of a gale from off the snow-capped ranges of the far south were
like dreams of heaven. But just where I was to go--what points in the
Patagonia coast and southward I was to visit--and how I was to make the
journey, I did not know. Indeed, when I reached Buenos Ayres, I was half
ashamed to make the inquiries which the lack of a guide book made
necessary.

However, I made bold to confess my ignorance, and eventually learned
that the Argentine Government kept three naval transports regularly
employed in voyages along the coast to the south, and that one was
loading for the voyage.

Four days later I piled my baggage into a carriage and drove to the
ship. I found the deck thronged with people and littered with baggage.
The officers were about in gold-laced uniforms. The people were in
holiday attire. A gang of 'longshoremen gathered about the carriage to
get at my baggage, but the ship's steward came to my rescue before I had
ceased wondering how I could escape, and in a trice everything was on
deck and under the eyes of policemen in sailor uniform who guard the
docks there. Then I had leisure to look the steamer over in a cursory
fashion. Here is what I learned:

The name of the ship was that of the capital of Argentine Tierra del
Fuego--_Ushuaia_. She had been built in Stockholm as a River Platte
lighter, but after some years of service in this humble capacity had
been purchased by the Argentine Government and made over for use in
carrying troops, supplies, passengers, and freight to and from the
various settlements established on the southern coasts in 1884.

When the transformation was complete there was a saloon 14×7 feet large
and 6 feet high between beams. On each side of the saloon were two
state-rooms, of which the forward ones were fitted with four bunks and
the others with two bunks. The larger state-rooms had the bunks lying
athwartships and the floor space between the bunks was 20 inches wide.
In the state-rooms aft the bunks lay fore and aft, and because of the
curve in the side of the ship, were narrower at the after end than the
forward. There was a little more spare space in these rooms than in the
rooms designed for four passengers, however, and so they were to be
preferred.

As said, the saloon was 7×14 feet large. In its centre was a table
3-1/2×8 feet large, while the companionway came down just forward of the
table. On the whole, the space left seemed scant, especially when I
learned that we numbered ten passengers, of whom two were ladies, the
wife and daughter of a Frenchman, bound to Santa Cruz to open a
wholesale general store.

Pretty soon there was a call to breakfast, and then we began to realize
just how scant the room was. Besides the ten passengers we had the
purser, the ship's agent, and another man at the table, and the table
was never intended to seat more than eight. There were six of us on each
side of the table that was but eight feet long. The steward could not
pass around the table to serve the food; he could only bring the
platters and tureens down the ladder and place them at the head of the
table, and then the purser had to do the rest without aid. However, the
food was abundant, and, by the Italian standard, well cooked. People who
don't like garlic might have objected to some of the dishes, but a
traveller should learn to like garlic. We had cold beef tongue with
onion salad, soup, a beef-stew called puchero that includes squashes
among its vegetables, stewed tripe, beefsteak fried with onions and
tomatoes, and we finished with fruit and black coffee. It was rather
awkward sitting with one's shoulders edgewise to the table, but we got
acquainted the easier for the discomfort and enjoyed the meal.

After breakfast we went on deck to smoke. We found the steward washing
the dishes of the whole six courses in a single soup tureen full of
water. The amount of water seemed rather small to me, but perhaps I was
mistaken, because when I called the attention of my fellow-passengers
to it they did not think it remarkable. They said he used a fresh tureen
of water for each course. Perhaps he did, but I'm bound to say the dish
water as I saw it was thicker than the soup we had eaten from the tureen
an hour before.

At 12 o'clock sharp, the hour of sailing, the Captain mounted the
bridge. He was a slender, swarthy little fellow with straight black hair
and a thin moustache. His name was H. V. Chwaites, and I learned that he
had reached a rank corresponding to the Yankee grade of commander in
sixteen years. Lighting a cigarette he shoved his hands into his pockets
and ordered the lines cast off. Nobody seemed to think it an unusual
circumstance that a naval Captain on the bridge should smoke cigarettes
or put his hands in his pockets.

As we rounded the turn in the bend of the channel below the docks the
pilot (a member of the ship's staff) ordered the quartermaster to right
the wheel immediately after the captain had ordered it hard over, and
the result was that we had to anchor to avoid grounding. Later still in
the long channel leading to the roadstead the pilot did the same thing
again. We were steaming along with a stiff breeze over the starboard
bow, while the steamer's nose was high out of water. In two minutes more
we were skating along over Rio Plate mud outside the channel, and the
upshot was that we had to call two tugs, which eventually towed us stern
first into the channel once more. Having had some experience with ship
captains, I was simply astounded when I found that this one did not
swear at the pilot for running the ship out of the channel; why, he did
not even remonstrate. He simply lighted a fresh cigarette and bowed his
thanks to the tug captains.

That afternoon the stiff breeze became a gale, and some of the
passengers looked with nervous apprehension at the spars of three
different wrecked ships that we passed, but it appeared from the
behavior of our steamer that she was a remarkable sea boat. Although but
one hundred and sixty feet long and about thirty-five broad, she rolled
so little in the sea that no racks were needed on the table when dinner
was served. In fact, the few of us not seasick had a very pleasant time
at the meal, for we had plenty of room.

Night brought new matters of interest. In spite of the storm it was a
warm, oppressive night, and the air of the cabin would have been
stilling even with the companionway wide open. The seasick ones wanted
the doors closed, and so they were closed. Worse yet, I had chosen one
of the after state-rooms because it had only two bunks. It had neither
port-hole nor skylight nor window of any kind. The door was small, and
it fitted the doorway, I thought, closer than any other two parts of the
cabin fitted each other. When shut my room was hermetically sealed. My
room-mate was very seasick and in a chill. Would I be so kind as to keep
the door closed? There was but one answer. I had to say it would afford
me great pleasure to do so. Reeking with perspiration I stripped, got
into night clothes, and turned down the bedding, and found both sheets
and blanket moister from the humidity of the air than the shirt I had
discarded.

Although not wishing to anticipate my story, I may say I never saw the
bedding a whit drier during the nine long weeks I was on board.

Morning came with surprises also. I was out early, but I had scarcely
completed my toilet when one of the four gentlemen in the room forward
of mine appeared and said:

"Will you make to me the favor of to permit me myself to wash in your
room? The wash-bowl there in ours is broken."

I said, "With pleasure." He washed. Another and another one followed
him. None of us thought about the slop pail under the bowl, and when it
had been filled the slops ran over and flooded the floor, whereat my
seasick room-mate groaned in anguish and swore feebly in French.

In the after state-room opposite mine was quartered an Argentine
lieutenant bound to Ushuaia to take command of a small Government
steamer. While the rest of us considered the slops we heard him calling
for the steward, who had not yet appeared, and we asked him if we could
be of assistance. He said we could. His door was shut and he could not
open it. Would one of us open it for him? A glance at it showed us we
could not. There was no knob to the lock.

My next door neighbor turned to look at his door, which had been open
all night. It had no knob to the lock. Neither had the door to the
state-room occupied by the French family. My door only of the four had a
knob, but that was found to be removable. Thereafter, when a door was
shut purposely or by the roll of the ship, the one imprisoned within
would bang the panel with his knuckles and say:

"Señor, that you may wish to make me the favor to bring the door knob."
Whereat every man present would skurry about to find the precious
article, because each was sure to want such a favor done for him, sooner
or later. We had a carpenter on board, too.

After washing ourselves a few of us gathered on deck near the head of
the companionway to get a breath of fresh air before coffee was served.
Among the rest was the French merchant, who was the best groomed man of
the lot. We were inclined to be cheerful as we watched the tumble of
waters, and hailed with delight the advent of the steward when he first
appeared. When he got closer to us we were not so much delighted. He was
carrying an open sugar-bowl and a platter of tiny sweet biscuit--the
certain signs of coming coffee. But before reaching the companionway he
had to pass a big chicken coop that occupied the centre of the
quarter-deck, and, as he explained afterward, he never did like
chickens. He had been seasick all night, and the sight and smell of that
coop were too much for his stomach. Rushing to the rail he leaned far
over, and, regardless of sugar-bowl and biscuit, paid a flowing tribute
to Neptune.

At that the dapper Frenchman grew white, exclaimed "Oh, my God!" and,
clasping his hands to his stomach, fled to the opposite rail.

However, the sea grew calm next day, and the warm sun came down on a sea
rippled by a gentle breeze. Everybody came on deck then, perfectly
willing and even anxious to be contented. But not all could succeed.
There were some who did not think any better of chickens than the
steward did.

The chicken coop, which stood on the quarter-deck, contained over thirty
chickens, and it was provided with a slat bottom. People who object to
having chickens roaming about over the lawn of a farm-house will
sympathize with the passengers on the _Ushuaia_ who did not like to have
a chicken coop in the centre of the quarter-deck. The roll of the ship
was slight, but it swashed the refuse of that coop clear across the
deck. Some of the passengers said such a condition was never before seen
on the quarter-deck of a naval ship. However, we all knew that it would
not do to brood over sorrows, and the livelier ones began to seek to
amuse the rest. The Frenchman knew a dice game different from any the
rest had ever heard of, but unfortunately had lost his dice. A German
doctor bound to a Tierra del Fuego gold camp supplied the lack by
whittling a set from a piece of Yankee pine.

Count Richard of Roedorn, Germany, a young man travelling for pleasure,
and bound for the same camp, had several decks of cards, and had learned
the Yankee game of poker. Several others knew enough of the game to make
it interesting for a couple who knew it better yet. The rank of the
Count, by the way, did not in any way interfere with his being a right
good travelling companion. He was well educated, a traveller of
experience, and he had a most cheerful disposition. So far as I
observed, not even a finical critic could have found more than one habit
about him to censure, though that, to be sure, would have excited the
severest remarks among the knowing people of New York. Count though he
was, he wore made-up ties.

However, to continue the story, Herr Ansorge, a miner, let us know that
he was a member of a German singing club in Buenos Ayres, and two
minutes later "Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay" was sung in four languages at
once--Spanish, French, German, and English. A half dozen other songs
followed in a way that demonstrated that if we were not trained
musicians we formed a cosmopolitan crowd that could enjoy life under
adverse circumstances off Patagonia.

Speaking of card playing reminds me that we saw much of it on that
steamer, especially on the way home, but poker was not the game. They
used the Spanish cards in which swords and cups take the place of spades
and diamonds, and the game was like that known in the States as Banker
in which the king was high. The lowest bet on this game was a dollar
currency, and, of course, money changed hands rapidly, but the greatest
win of any night's play was $150.

The prevailing winds of that region in April are found between west and
south. The _Ushuaia_ bunted and bobbed her way through a head sea for
five days before the high alluvial cliffs that mark the entrance to New
Gulf loomed through the chilled mist of a storming morning. Then the
wind shifted and came on in scurrying squalls. We had theretofore
travelled on with the utmost care for the safety of everything about the
ship, but now the captain made sail to help the steam, until the masts
groaned under the strain. She was a slow tub--good for eight or eight
and a half knots in smooth water, but under the press of canvas she
drove across New Gulf at more than ten. The passengers looked on in
delight and wonder. Soon after noon we rounded to before a landscape
that was made up of low, white alluvial cliffs, alternating with sloping
brown stretches of sage brush and sand, behind which rose a range of
hills to complete a picture for all the world like those to be seen in
the deserts of southeastern California. Then, even before the sails were
furled, the captain ordered a boat lowered into the water, and he was
hastily rowed to the shore.

Later I got ashore myself. The captain met me at the landing. Would I
like to meet the agent of the little railroad running down to Chubut? I
would. He was a Welshman, who, of course, talked English, and had lived
in the country twelve years. We walked over the desert sand to a long
shanty of vertical boards roofed with galvanized iron. The captain
walked in through an open door as one who felt at home might do. The
room was a marvel of neatness, considering the surroundings, and there
was a piano in the corner. While the captain enjoyed my admiring glance,
a door to an adjoining room opened, and a most attractive girl of
perhaps seventeen came in.

"Is this the agent of the railroad?" I asked, when we had been
introduced.

"No, she is the telegraph operator," replied the captain; "but she will
tell you anything about the country you may wish to learn for the
benefit of the North Americans."

"Will you do that?" said I to her.

"I shall be glad to, unless you would rather talk with father," she
replied, turning her big blue eyes on me in a way that showed she knew
very well no man would want to see, or hear, or think of anybody else
while she was around.

Three or four days later the _Ushuaia_ was steaming slowly down the
coast, bound for the ancient resort of pirates called Port Desire. It
was a dreamy, Indian summer day, and the passengers were idling about
when a servant asked me to go to the captain's quarters. I found him
picking a guitar, but he put it away as I entered, and took a slip cut
from a newspaper out of his pocket and handed it to me. Would I be so
kind as to translate the little poem printed on the slip from English
into Spanish? I would try. It was the story of a girl who stood on a
pier weeping for a sailor whom the sharks had eaten in a far-away port,
and it had a refrain:

"And the waves sigh low
As they ebb and flow,
For they know that the sea is fraught with woe."

"She gave it to me," said the captain. "It must be very beautiful," and
he nodded his head to the point of the compass that was in a line to the
anchorage we had left in New Gulf. "We will be back in thirty days,"
continued the captain, "and then I will ask her father."

It took us more than six weeks to get back. Then the captain once more
hastened ashore. I watched him through a glass as he entered the door,
but no one met him there. I do not know why this was so, but I guessed
that this handsome little telegraph operator had some of the
characteristics that make pretty girl operators in the States so
tantalizingly charming. I guess she was a coquette who thought a naval
ship captain legitimate prey.

[Illustration: AMONG THE RUINS AT PORT DESIRE, PATAGONIA.]

At Port Desire the view of the settlement is disappointing. One hears in
advance that sixty people live there. As the ship enters port one sees a
long gray corrugated iron house that is two stories high in the middle,
one story high at each end, and apparently one room deep. It stands on a
little plateau on the left (south) just at the entrance of the harbor.
Tower Rock, a Y-shaped natural column, rises a few hundred steps away
behind it, and a tall-flagstaff, braced almost as well as a ship's mast,
stands in front. Both tower and staff serve the mariner as landmarks in
entering port. Then three leagues away to the south of this building is
seen another. It is of the sort found in American mine camps--a wood and
iron structure. Next, the old ruins under the precipice at the north
shore come into view, and among them are seen two more iron roofs, the
bodies of the houses being very well concealed by the old stone walls.
Last of all, one sees close down to the water on the south side, and not
far from the first house noticed, another iron structure that is low,
but wide and long, and has a pile of very crooked firewood on the beach
before it. And that is all one sees of the settlement of Port Desire.

This settlement cannot be said to be growing. Desire River furnishes
excellent pasturage. Vegetables in abundance can be grown, and even
grain, to a fair extent, with a little irrigation, while the range for
sheep is said to be much better than in many parts of the territory down
near the strait; but people will not come here because it is so far from
any base of supplies which they can visit on horseback. The calls the
Argentine naval transports make are irregular. There was one stretch of
nine months in the last two years when no steamer visited the port. Of
course, nobody went hungry or suffered for lack of absolute necessaries
during that time, because the cattle, the guanacos, the panthers, and
the ostriches supplied all things needful. With plenty of meat, a little
salt, and the guanaco fur robes, the frontier ranchman of the Argentina
does very well--so well that he will not take the trouble to raise even
his favorite vegetable, the squash. But what worries him, when the
steamer fails to come, is the inevitable famine of _maté_, the wild tea
of Paraguay. The consumption of this herb is a remarkable feature of
Argentine life, north and south, but in Patagonia there is no citizen
but would take _maté_ rather than a good dinner if he had to choose
between the two. Then, too, wine and the native rum become exhausted,
and so does tobacco. The traveller who looks at the settlement
dispassionately will say that so long as famines of drinks and tobacco
impend, there is no great hope for its future.

For the last three or four years the post of sub-prefect at Port Desire
has been filled by Don Juan Wilson. Don Juan when a boy was known as
Johnnie Wilson at Alexandria, Va., but his people emigrated to the
Argentine, and the lad entered the naval school, where he was graduated
with honor. Something of his subsequent career is worth telling to
illustrate the Argentine way of doing things. Lieutenant Wilson has been
in all the wars but one of the Argentine for a quarter of a century. He
has a dozen medals which were given to him for services rendered, and he
can show more scars obtained in battle than he has medals, but he is a
Lieutenant still, although men who entered the navy after and below him,
rank as Commodores and Admirals. That looks as if he had been treated
very unfairly, but the truth is he can thank his lucky stars, as he
says, that he is no worse off. He has been in every revolution against
the Government but one, and every time but once has been of the losing
party. He might have been shot lawfully several times, but because he
was a conspicuously good fighter, and therefore sure to be very useful
in case of a war with a foreign nation, his life has not only been
spared, but he has been retained in the service. But because he was
always ripe for a revolt they sent him down to Patagonia. He could not
revolt there or help anybody revolting in Buenos Ayres, and in case he
were needed to fight Chili or Brazil he could be had very quickly. The
reason he failed to take part in one revolution--the last--was that he
was in Patagonia while the revolt was in the capital. When talking to me
about it he seemed to be very sorry that he had not been able to join
his comrades, and that, too, though every one of them was in prison
under sentences of from twenty years up.

Of the life naval officers in Patagonia lead I had a glimpse at Port
Desire, where I had dinner and remained over night with Lieutenant
Wilson. The barracks were found to be comfortable and even cheerful
within, though as bleak as the desert without. At the table the
Lieutenant sat at the head, with a junior officer and his wife on the
right, and the Lieutenant's son, a bright lad of seventeen, on the left.
Two boys waited on the table with a military precision of motion that
was very funny to a non-military spectator. We had excellent
fare--Italian soup, fish from the river, roast beef, and two vegetables,
with bread and coffee and cigarettes after.

One of the waiters had a history. He was a full-blooded Tehuelche
Indian. The Lieutenant, while leading a squad of sailors up the Rio
Negro in General Roca's war of extermination, heard a curious cry in the
thick boughs of a tree. A sailor climbed up, expecting to find some
strange beast or bird, but brought back a boy baby not over two years of
age. He had been hidden there in a three-prong fork by his mother as the
Indians fled because she was too much exhausted to carry him further. No
doubt many Indians did the same, but all the babies starved save this
one because the sailors held the territory. When old enough to serve as
an apprentice, the lad was shipped in the navy with his adopted father,
Mr. Wilson.

Certainly no other sergeant in the world has had such a history as this
one.

When we reached Port Desire we all went ashore to inspect the old ruins
of a Spanish fort, and then a desert cattle man invited us all to dine
with him.

We found the home of our host standing among the old ruins. The contrast
between the ancient Spanish and the modern Argentine architecture was
very great. The old walls were of thick masonry carried up as high as a
man could reach, and above these there had been wooden roofs thatched
with grass. The modern structure, built by the Argentine Government to
induce settlers to come, consisted of a light wooden frame entirely
covered in with corrugated iron. One sees just such houses in the mine
camps of the United States, where they are popular because cheaply and
quickly built. But not till one has been in such a house built where the
wind blows as it does on the Patagonia desert, can he fully appreciate
its capabilities as a musical instrument. When we came to sit down to
the long, bench-like table for dinner, after a walk over the hills that
had sharpened our appetites, we paused to listen as if to the notes of a
great organ played by the hands of a mad musician. Probably the
corrugations of the iron, the sharp edges of the plates, the lengths of
plates projecting unsupported beyond slender beams, and the differing
degrees of rigidness with which the plates were secured to the beams,
combined to vary the vibrations of the plates under the impulse of the
whirling wind squalls.

There were soft and smooth murmurs, hoarse boomings, fair altos, and
singing sopranos, alternately and combined in a way to interest and
distract every unaccustomed listener.

The dinner was, in itself, a most interesting novelty. We had beef
roasted in a fashion which the natives call "meat with skin." The ribs
of a steer had been wrapped in the skin of the animal, and then impaled
on a long iron rod, which was thrust into the ground so that the
wrapped-up meat leaned directly above a small open fire. Here it had
remained for about three hours, while a patient native fed the flames
with brush, and occasionally turned the bundle of meat. It was then
removed, the skin was stripped off, and it was brought, dripping with
hot juice, in a big pan to the table, where the hungry passengers
awaited it, knives in hand.

The knives were of a class novel to an American, and, in fact, so was
everything about the table. Each knife blade was a triangle, an inch
broad at the handle, and tapered to an acute point, four and a half
inches away. This was a good shape for the usual purpose for which it
was designed--the skinning of animals, but it was not a good table
knife. Even at that the ranchman had not enough to go round, and three
of us had to use the knives we had carried, in anticipation of such a
lack. Shallow tins served as plates. And yet, in spite of so great
poverty in table furniture, we had an abundance of very good claret,
served in glasses of a proper shape.

The food, too, was as surprisingly good as the wine. No better roast was
ever carved than that, and it was flanked with baked armadillos, the
most toothsome morsel I had ever seen. Both kinds of meat were seasoned
with salt and pepper only. With these we had hard biscuit of the Buenos
Ayres sort--an oblong, globular little loaf, say two by three inches
large in its longest and shortest diameters. The absence of garlic and
Italian sauces completed our pleasure, and black coffee, served in tin
cups, ended the meal.

The next port at which we called was Santa Cruz. The great profits made
by the sheep owners who brought their stock from the Falklands to the
Strait of Magellan, induced many of the young men of the Falklands to
come over and try their luck in Patagonia. The Argentine Government
encouraged them by giving ten-year leases on pasture land at the rate of
$60 national money per year per league, and at the average one league
would hold 1200 sheep. The traveller will hear all about the increase in
the flocks on the Santa Cruz River before he gets there, and the stories
of the wool shipments will prepare him to see a small but bustling
community when he arrives. I really expected to see a large as well as a
bustling place.

When the steamer had anchored in the stream about ten miles above the
mouth there were seen in the distance at the south bank, under what is
known as Weddell's Bluff, several new frame shanties which the ship's
officers called the presidio. I went up there in a boat, and found
enough of the little shanties to house at least 3000 soldiers, while an
old hulk moored at the beach would have accommodated 200 sailors easily
enough. There were a dozen sailors with two officers on board the hulk
as shipkeepers, while the barracks were in charge of two officers and a
score of soldiers, some of whom were keeping house with their families.
The building of these barracks in that locality could have but one
signification: The Argentine Government expects trouble, sooner or
later, with Chili, and this is to be a base for operations against the
Strait of Magellan possessions of the Western republic.

[Illustration: SANTA CRUZ, PATAGONIA.]

The buildings were not all completed, and some of the soldiers were at
work as carpenters and painters. This show of business activity only
added to my mental picture of the town itself, and it was with
considerable pleasure that I returned down stream to land near the ship,
and make my first visit there.

Climbing to the low table land that borders the stream, I looked back
into a wedge-shaped valley between the hills, the Valley of the
Missionaries, and saw Santa Cruz--in all nine buildings, of which two
were unoccupied, and not a human being in sight anywhere, nor any other
evidences of life than a small flock of sheep and a thin red mare
grazing idly. The buildings stood on three sides of a surveyed
plaza--that is, there was one house on each of two sides, one stood back
up the valley a few hundred yards, and the rest were on a third side of
the plaza. Among them was the inevitable long low iron structure built
for the home and office of the Sub-Prefect. There was also a one-story
adobe-walled house that was a combined hotel and general store, having
four rooms, while another was a pink wooden building, one story and a
quarter high, having five rooms that served the same useful purpose.

Among the buildings was an old adobe-walled structure, about ten by
twenty feet large, with two places for doors, and the remains of a
couple of glazed windows. The earth served as a floor, and the usual
iron for a roof. In one corner was a depression that looked like a dry
hog wallow, and a porker grunted about outside the building. They said
this had been the church that missionaries preached in long ago.

In the pink hotel I found a well-dressed young man who was glad to see
all strangers, and particularly one who wrote for a newspaper. He
accepted an invitation to take a cup of coffee, and when I asked him if
he was acquainted with the region he said he had been just at the point
of asking me if I would be interested in hearing something about it.
Then the coffee came, and with it a Dutchess County, N. Y., brand of
condensed milk, and a blue-print map. We combined the milk and coffee,
and then spread out the map and weighted the corners with our cups, the
coffee pot, and the milk can.

Being thus ready for business, the young man pointed at the map. It was
the plan of a great city--a city with plazas connected by wide avenues
and boulevards, with streets running at right angles between. Figures
and letters scattered here and there on it showed sites for Government
and other important buildings, while long broken lines showed the
location of many street railways. The young man explained the
peculiarities and advantages of the disposition of plazas and boulevards
and street car lines, and eventually, from the lay of the land, I
grasped the situation. This was the plan of the city of Santa Cruz, the
great Patagonian metropolis that was to grow up right there in the
valley, where now one could see nine houses all told, of which two were
unoccupied. It would grow just as surely as the sun would set behind
Weddell Bluff, to quote the words of the young man; and then he went on,
in a way to make even a Kansas town-site boomer rub his eyes, to tell of
the shipments of wool "aggregating 2,000,000 pounds last year," of the
good pasture to be had "at £3 per square league annual rental," of the
"traces of gold found on Lake Argentine, where good mineral developments
will be made," of the "experiments in wheat culture to be made, which
will doubtless succeed." All of this was said to show that I had
arrived at just the right time to get in on the ground floor of a great
real estate deal. I did not need to buy the lots. I could have all I
would build on free of cost, save for the usual charges of making out
and recording the papers.

I have frequently heard men who had done business with Spanish-American
nations talk despairingly of the lack of enterprise to be found there.
They speak of the depreciated currency there as "adobe money," and call
the nations "the land of _poco tiempo_" and "the mañana country." As to
many of these nations the terms are well applied, but the Argentine must
be excepted. Neither in the suburbs of Brooklyn, nor on the plains of
Oklahoma, nor among the orange groves of California have I seen a boomer
who could tell his story in better form than the young man with a
blue-print map of the future metropolis of Patagonia.

It is perhaps worth noting here that while the young man was talking I
could see an ordinance on the wall above his head that prohibited the
killing of either ostriches or guanacos "within the city limits," even
with bolas, while the shooting of such game was prohibited in all the
districts south of the river.

And yet I am not sure but a large town will grow there eventually,
although Gallegos was made the capital town some time ago. The place
certainly has some natural advantages. The Santa Cruz River is a wonder.
Being absolutely unobstructed throughout its course, large, deep-draught
river steamers could run easily to the source, Lake Argentine, and
beyond. It is really likely that gold mines will be developed in the
Andes there, and it is certain that a large lumber business will be done
there sooner or later, for the forests produce cedars and other
valuable saw timber of the best quality and great size. There are no
trees immediately on Lake Argentine, but it is connected with other
lakes by navigable channels where the timber is found. When I was in
Santa Cruz a party of capitalists familiar with lumber had gone up to
the lakes to look into the business. Driving the logs in rafts to the
port of Santa Cruz would be so inexpensive that once a proper mill were
established there the great markets of Buenos Ayres and Rio Janeiro, not
to mention the smaller ports, would be supplied at prices to make
serious inroads on the business of those who now supply them from the
United States.

Of the value of the sheep and cattle ranches as a support for a town
nothing need be said to readers in the United States, who have object
lessons in the matter scattered over the prairie States, but the
Patagonia ranches will scarcely make as good a support for a town as the
Yankee ranches do, for the reason that the land system of the Argentine
promotes great estates and discourages small owners. The capitalist in
Argentine territory can buy all the land he wants. Gov. Mayer of Santa
Cruz territory, for instance, owns thirty square leagues of land along
the Santa Cruz and Chico rivers. In owning the water front, he controls
all the range back of it, for no one will take up land that has no
water. For all practical purposes, he controls say one hundred square
leagues. The firm of Hamilton & Saunders of Gallegos, Scotchmen, own
fifty-eight leagues, and so control three times as much. Of course, it
would be much better for the country if fifty-eight families owned and
lived on the land these two men have, nevertheless the country is
filling up with shepherds, and a month after the two French merchants
mentioned had landed in Santa Cruz with the wholesale stock of goods,
they were doing a profitable business with their original packages.

There is but one drawback to the value of the valley in which Santa Cruz
city is located that would operate against it seriously, and that is the
lack of drinking water. The young boomer did not say a word about water.
There is a scant supply from wells even for the seven occupied houses
with their stock, and that is brackish. Of course, should the place
become a great city, the supply would be drawn from the swift Santa
Cruz, but while the settlement is growing to a village of a few thousand
people the cost of twenty odd miles of pipe line would prohibit tapping
the river. The tide rises over forty feet every day in the river mouth,
so there is salt water a long way up stream.

It is worth noting that the Santa Cruz people draw water from their
wells as the people in the cowboy parts of the United States often do. A
pulley is suspended over the well. When water is wanted a horse is
saddled, and one end of a lasso fastened to the saddle. The other end of
the lasso is passed through the pulley and made fast to a pail, which is
then lowered and filled. Then the water drawer mounts the horse, and
rides away till the pail is up to the pulley. Next the rider dismounts,
walks back to the well, takes the pail from the lasso and carries it to
the house. Last of all he unsaddles the horse. I saw this done myself. I
must admit that this description of the Patagonian way of drawing a pail
of water reads like a traveller's untrue tale, but it is literally true.

Gallegos, the capital of Santa Cruz territory, the next port visited,
stands on the south bank of the Gallegos River, several miles above the
mouth. The Gallegos is a very interesting stream. Its head is in the
Cordilleras, of course, and the head is made up of a number of small
streams which unite in the foot hills to make a river never less than
180 feet wide and three feet deep in the dryest of seasons. The current
is fair, and although there are three fording places along its route,
large steamers drawing 2-1/2 feet of water could navigate it to the
forks the year round. But that steamers will ever be found there is a
matter of doubt, although the country is rapidly filling up with
settlers. There are several reasons for this. All branches of the stream
rise within a few miles of the Pacific Ocean, the south heads being
almost within sight of Skyring Water, just northwest from Punta Arenas,
while between the north and the south forks there is a complete and a
wide break in the Andes through which one may drive a wagon as easily as
one can drive over the mesa of Patagonia anywhere. By cutting a road
five miles long through a belt of timber a highway to the bays of Chili
will be formed, and so the traffic of at least half the length of the
Gallegos River will go to the west instead of down stream to the
Argentine town of Gallegos. I say at least half, but it is not unlikely
that more than half will go west, for the reason that the entire
population of the territory south of the Gallegos, and about all between
Rio Gallegos and Rio Santa Cruz have a strong feeling of friendship for
Chili.

"In Chili, if you have right, you can get justice every time," said a
Frenchman owning 100,000 sheep on the border line between Argentine and
Chili. "In the Argentine you must have the judge for your friend or you
will be beaten, right or wrong."

[Illustration: THE GOVERNOR'S HOME AND A BUSINESS BLOCK IN GALLEGOS, THE
CAPITAL OF PATAGONIA.]

As to the Rio Gallegos lands, the traveller finds lava beds and pasture
lands alternating, but the pasture has the greater area, and it is
simply perfect pasture. The low bottom lands are flooded in September
and October when the Andes snow melts, but there is plenty of good
upland pasture. Nearly all the land south of it is now taken up by
shepherds, while the north side is being rapidly absorbed, the chief
obstacle to rapid settlement being the lack of fuel. It is almost a
bushless region.

On the whole, the town of Gallegos has a very good cattle country back
of it. Along the sea-coast to the south it has some placer gold mines.
The layer of black sand carrying gold crops out richer in some places
than others, and there are places where the lack of drinking water makes
mining impossible, but quite a number of men--perhaps fifty--can be
found working the beach for gold between Gallegos and Cape Virgins.

What the traveller sees in the territorial capital now is a score or
less of corrugated iron buildings, with half a dozen houses of wood and
three of adobe. One of the adobe-walled houses is the territorial
prison. Any smart rascal could burrow out in an hour. About one-third of
the houses are hotels and stores, the outer appearance of these
buildings being like that of a Yankee mining camp. Every store carries a
considerable stock of liquors and tobacco, a moderate stock of hardware
and cutlery likely to attract ranchmen, a small stock of wool and cotton
fabrics, and a few samples of groceries. The stocks were not arranged to
make anything like an attractive display, and, because sand storms were
likely to come at any time to dust over the interior of every building,
nobody thought it worth while to sweep or in any way clean house.

As hotels (every store was a hotel) the places were most unattractive;
worse, for instance, than any I saw when _The Sun_ sent me through the
wilds of southern Mexico. In Mexico all of a party of travellers, men,
women, children, and servants, would be lodged in a single room, with
nothing but the tile floor or a bench to sleep on, but it was always a
clean floor, while one could have a hammock under a veranda if he chose,
and that was about the best kind of bed. Moreover, food was always
abundant and good. At some Gallegos hotels one could not be certain of
either quantity or quality of the food, while the blankets were neither
washed nor aired nor changed.

However, there were exceptions to the rule, at least one exception. Doña
Philomena, a rotund and jolly woman of middle age, with her son, a lad
of about sixteen, kept a boarding-house in an adobe hut of one room,
twelve by eighteen feet. She had a stove that smoked at every crevice on
one side of the door, a rude table with benches at the other, a spare
bed just beyond, and beyond this bed heaps and piles of boxes and bags
and bundles, containing vegetables, groceries, clothing, Indian curios,
saddles, and horse gear generally. There were three kinds of meat
hanging from the rafters. There was but one tiny window, and that
yielded light enough only for the table. In the extreme rear of the room
all was concealed by impenetrable gloom. A Yankee wife would have said
she never did see such a cluttered up place. Nevertheless, the mud walls
had been whitewashed until they looked like the dried up bottom of a
pool in an alkali desert. The mud floor was neatly swept. The spare bed
had clean white sheets, and the blankets smelled sweet. The rude table
was covered with a snowy cloth, and there was a stainless napkin at
each plate. Doña Philomena wore a clean dress, with a bright-colored
shawl over her shoulders. The picture of her as she worked over the
stove in a thin halo of blue smoke, giving a stir to the potatoes frying
in the pan or a peek at the mutton roasting in the oven, or cutting
fresh bread, or opening Yankee condensed milk, while she smiled and
joked and gossiped in a continuous flow of words, was something that the
traveller would carry with him for a long time after. And when the meal
was over and we all smoked and lingered over the coffee the boy got out
an old guitar and played the tunes the Spanish lover plays to win a
sweetheart--tunes that alternately swelled with importunate passion and
faded into murmurs of hopeless longing, so that everybody stopped
talking to stare into space and think of somebody else a long way off.

The Captain of the steamer introduced me to Gov. Edelmiro Mayer. The
Governor lived in a large frame one-story building that had a
glass-enclosed veranda overlooking the river. On the whole, this was a
most remarkable home, considering the locality. Though like a
mining-camp house, as the rest were in outward appearance, there were
within Oriental rugs of great value on the floor; a grand piano of
American make that cost $1500 in gold in New York stood in one corner of
the parlor; a great organ such as professional musicians prefer was in
another; a library of 5000 volumes, made up of standard works of science
and literature, was in the glass-enclosed veranda, while the furniture
and hangings and bric-à-brac were everything that a cultivated taste
could ask for. So was the sideboard, with its old Kentucky whiskey.
Having very little governing to do, the Governor devoted himself to
literature and music, occupations in which he was ably assisted by his
wife, a charming Argentina.

Gov. Mayer's name is not unknown to American history. Just for the love
of adventure and free republican institutions he came to the United
States to help during the war of the rebellion. He commanded a negro
regiment with conspicuous success. Afterward, while down on the Rio
Grande, he crossed over to help patriotic Mexicans overthrow Maximilian.

Although small in the number of its houses and its people, Gallegos is
in full plumage as a territorial capital. A two-story frame building was
in course of construction that will eventually be the White House of
Santa Cruz territory. Besides the Governor, there was the usual list of
other officials necessary for the dignity of such a place. As at
Ushuaia, already described, no official had anything to do worth
mention. Indeed, the Captain of Police, who in a United States
territorial capital would need to be a man of nerve and muscle, was here
a cripple who could neither sit on a horse nor walk unaided the length
of the town's one street. Still, courts were held sometimes to decide
conflicting claims of shepherds, and a gaucho who had slashed a comrade
in a drunken brawl was arrested just before I arrived. Gallegos will be
a favored stopping place for criminals when the country gets filled up,
I guess, for it is very handy to the Chili line, and extradition
treaties between two such countries as Chili and Argentine are of little
value.

A peculiarity of the climate is the southwest wind of summer. It begins
at 8 in the morning and increases in violence until after noon, when it
occasionally blows hard enough to lift a man from the saddle. At 3 in
the afternoon it moderates, and at 6 o'clock and thence on through the
night there is usually a calm. This wind blows every day in spring and
summer, and on many days it brings hail and sleet that no man can face.
The winter season, though colder, is by far the most pleasant of the
year. But in spite of wind and cold, Patagonia is pre-eminently a
healthful region now. Every human being that I saw there carried the
glow of health in his face and the spring of youth in his muscles. But
there are zymotic diseases just as there are in Yankee villages, because
of the juxtaposition of wells and cesspools, and these diseases will
prevail wherever settlements are made, because of the utter indifference
of Spanish-Americans to the rules of hygiene as applied in such matters.

To sum it all up, the settlements on the coast of Patagonia are small,
the buildings are of the temporary or mine-camp class, and life in them
is decidedly tranquil. The towns are new, and the bad name the country
has borne in the matter of climate and sterility has kept foreigners
away. "There has been no boom--just a slow, healthy growth," as the
Kansas boomers' paper would put it, and in this case the statement is
true. Santa Cruz territory now has 800,000 sheep. Its Governor expects
to see 10,000,000 there in ten years more, besides some millions of
horses and cattle. Settlements will very likely spring up in the
interior, and the vast region over which the Tehuelche Indians held
undisputed sway during the 350 years after the land was discovered by
white men will become a peaceful, thinly populated pastoral land, whose
people will grow comfortably rich supplying Europe and the United States
with wool, hides, and tallow. But there are no indications worth
mentioning that, as a whole, it will ever be anything else than this,
and at present it is of interest to the Yankee nation chiefly as a
region out of the way for tourists to visit.

After leaving Port Desire we had a variation in our meals on board ship.
The sailors had gone fishing with a net, and with success. There were
two kinds,--one rather like a Yankee smelt, only more slender, and the
other somewhat like a Lake Erie pickerel. Both were excellent, but the
little fellow boiled and made into a salad was particularly fine.

Then, too, a species of ducks had become very abundant. They were so
dark above as to appear black, while the under parts were pure white.
Their curiosity led them to hover about the ship in twos and threes,
sometimes flying along, say fifty feet above the weather rail. On such
occasions Captain Chwaites brought out a light shotgun. On the day we
entered Santa Cruz he knocked so many down on deck that the passengers
had roast duck for one course at dinner. In fact, for a citizen of South
America, the captain was a remarkably fine sportsman. He never used a
shotgun on a sitting bird. He could kill gulls at long range with a
rifle when they were bobbing about on the waves. While we lay in Rio
Gallegos he rode out on the table-land one day with a man living there
and killed three guanacos, using the bolas Indian fashion to bring them
down. The tourist who sails with Captain Chwaites can expect to have
game at the table frequently during the voyage.

But it should not be inferred from what has been said so far that the
table was beyond criticism during my voyage. For instance, the napkins
were not changed at any time oftener than once a week, and at the last
the interval increased to ten days. The table-cloth remained unchanged
an equal period; this, too, during the home voyage, when the number of
first-class passengers had increased to twenty-five and the table had to
be set twice.

The captain was not unaware of the condition of affairs. He stood beside
me one day while the steward shook the table-cloth over the rail. It
looked as one could expect a cloth to look after ten days' use at sea.

"Look at that cloth," said the bold skipper. "Did you ever see such a
dirty lot of passengers?"

I was eating in those days in the Captain's sitting-room, and his remark
had no personal application. I replied:

"Looks vile, don't it? But why don't you order the steward to wash it?"

"I cannot. There is so little soap. Look at my hands. I have no soap to
wash them with. The passengers know we have no soap. They ought to be
careful, like gentlemen."

His hands certainly showed the lack of soap. So did those of the
steward. We got a cup of coffee with a handful of sweet crackers in lieu
of the meal called breakfast in the United States. One did not want even
that many if he happened to see the steward serving them with his
unwashed hands.

Then the vegetables, which were abundant on leaving Buenos Ayres,
dwindled away before we entered the Straits of Magellan. At Punta Arenas
cabbages, turnips, potatoes, and some other roots are grown and sold at
low prices, but we got such a scant supply that for the last three weeks
of the voyage our food consisted chiefly of meat, dried peas and beans,
and hard bread.

Worse yet, the bed linen was not changed during the entire voyage of
nine and a half weeks. Complaints were of no avail, so I was at last
glad to leave my bunk and roll up in a fur robe of Indian manufacture
that I bought when in the Rio Gallegos. With a lounge in place of a
bunk, I was as dry and comfortable as I had been damp and miserable in
the bunk. Should any reader of this try the voyage he will need to take
a large supply of woollen under- and night-wear, including socks. The
proper changes of these will serve in place of changes of bedding.

Nor is the list of discomforts complete. When leaving the River Plate
the air in the saloon and state-rooms was insufferably close. There was
no ventilation for the state-rooms save through the doors into the
saloon. The saloon was ventilated through the doors at the head of the
companionway and through the skylight, but there was no sort of wind
sail or device to force the air down. In the summer time in the River
Plate, where the thermometer sometimes marks 110° in the shade, that
saloon is to be compared only with a Turkish bath. In winter, while
coasting along Tierra del Fuego, that same saloon becomes like the vault
of a cold storage company. The air is saturated with moisture, and the
temperature barely above the freezing point. The moisture gathered like
dew on the walls of the saloon as well as of the state-rooms, and
sometimes trickled down to form little pools in the bunks and on the
floor. There was no device for heating or drying the cabin, neither
stove nor steam-coil. We were dressed continually in the heaviest
flannels, and wore heavy overcoats, but the chill air penetrated
everything, even to the marrow of the bones.

I once passed two weeks in Greenland in the month of October, and
exactly two years later was digging away the snow in the Rocky Mountains
nine thousand feet above the sea, that I might have bare ground for my
blankets at night. My home is in the Adirondacks, where the snow lies
four feet deep all winter long, but I have never suffered from the cold
as I did during four weeks of this voyage.

And yet at times, when the conditions were such as to make us all most
uncomfortable, we often enjoyed life rather better than at any others.
Our greatest trouble when the weather first became cold was to pass the
evenings. It was stupid turning into wet bunks at 7 P.M., and wretched
work trying to play cards or spin stories in a raw, cold, reeking
saloon.

But a happy inspiration struck one of us while standing by the hatch
leading to the little store-room abaft the cabin. This store-room was in
charge of the shortest and thickest man aboard ship--a person who looked
as if he had once been a typical quartermaster on a Yankee man-o'-war--a
great tall, broad-shouldered, impassive, full-whiskered man, but through
some accident had been telescoped down to a stature of four feet nine.
The first cold evening after leaving the River Plate a passenger, while
walking the deck for exercise, stopped by the store-room hatch just as
the captain's valet came there carrying a plate with a tumbler on it.

"Storekeeper?" said the lackey.

"Yes," replied the thick, short man.

"Cocktail."

"Yes, sir. Quickly."

A few minutes later the storekeeper came up the ladder carrying a glass
tube about ten inches long and two wide. It was closed at the bottom and
had a long-handled silver plunger in it. The tube had about two inches
of a light brownish liquor in the bottom over a layer of sugar.
Standing the tube on the deck the storekeeper pumped the plunger up and
down vigorously. The aroma of gin, bitters, lemon, and something else
greeted the nostrils of the passenger. The storekeeper poured the
mixture into the glass until the glass was full. Then he looked at the
tube. There was a quarter of an inch of the mixture left there. Backing
carefully down into the store-room the storekeeper looked up at the
passenger. He saw that the passenger was looking at the remnant in the
tube. The storekeeper's face was absolutely impassive, as a whole, but
when he caught the passenger's eye he looked down at the remnant,
moistened his lips with his tongue, looked up slowly at the passenger
again, and then his right eyelid trembled expressively as he said:

"It is a cold night, is it not, sir?"

The passenger went down into the saloon and gathered about the table the
French merchant, the German count, the miner, the doctor, the Argentine
lieutenant, and several others. Then the steward was called. Could he
bring some things from the store-room? He would be pleased. What would
the gentlemen have?

The order ran something like this: Brandy, sugar, lemons, claret, and a
plenty of hot tea to be brought after the other articles were delivered.
A hot soup tureen was also included in the order. Some sugar was placed
in the tureen and a bottle of brandy poured over it. Then the brandy was
fired, and the blazing mixture was stirred with a big spoon till the
sugar was dissolved. After that a bottle of claret was stirred in, and
then a pot of hot tea, equal in measure to the two bottles previously
used, was stirred in also. Last of all a lemon was sliced in, peeling
and all, while the stirring was continued.

Possibly this mixture would not be countenanced by the art drink mixers
of New York. There may be something wrong with the process or something
lacking in the alcoholic values, but for travellers on an Argentine
naval transport, who are wearied through idleness and chilled by the
mists and the blasts of the Patagonia coast, the drink is a blessing
from Bacchus.

It was a temperate crowd, on the whole. The exceptional man was my best
friend. I left him early one night on deck and turned in. We were then
off Gu St. George. At 2 o'clock next morning came this man and dragged
me from my fur robe and said hoarsely:

"On deck quickly. The ship sinks."

Then he fled on deck. Though but half awake, I could hear the ship's
pump throbbing at lightning speed. I fled on deck as he had done. He had
disappeared. The Captain tranquilly smoked a cigarette under the bridge.

"My friend So-and-so just told me the ship was sinking," said I. The
Captain shrugged his shoulders.

"He has had six bottles to-night," said he. "It is he, not the ship,
that is full." The engineer had been testing the pump, and the noise of
it had made the fancies of my friend run on disaster at sea.

The curios which a traveller may gather on a voyage like this are not
many in variety, but they are very interesting as far as they go. Most
people would call the Patagonia guanaco skin robe or blanket the most
valuable product of native industry. The pelage of the young guanaco is
a soft and beautiful fur--red on the back, like that of a Virginia deer,
and shading into pure white underneath. The skins of the young that are
just about to be born or have just been born are preferred, because the
fur is then exquisitely fine and the skin never gets hard and stiff.
The Patagonia squaws cut the young skins into pieces, which they set
together in the form of a great blanket in which the colors of the fur
are shown to the greatest advantage. The sewing is done with sinews.
These robes are everywhere used for beds in that region, while no desert
man or sheep herder would think of living without one in lieu of any
other kind of a blanket for his protection when sleeping in the open
air. In Punta Arenas the price was $35 paper each, or not far from $9.50
gold. In Patagonia ports at the north they can be had for a little less.
There is no difficulty in finding them on sale. They would probably
bring from $60 to $75 gold each in the States.

The Patagonia squaw weaves as well as sews furs. The long hair is
sheared from the guanaco skin and twisted into threads, which are woven
much as the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico weave their threads of wool.
The Patagonian makes small woven blankets called ponchos, which are used
as neck and shoulder wraps and as saddle blankets, but would look very
well as rugs on a Northern carpet. By the use of dyes, bought of the
whites, a variety of bright colors are obtained, but these are
intermingled only in plain stripes. When compared with the blankets
produced by the Indians of Guatemala--blankets whose figures of fighting
beasts and birds have a savage beauty that is marvellous to behold--the
art of the Patagonia squaw makes but a sorry showing. Nevertheless, a
special saddle blanket, woven with a long nap of twisted threads that is
designed to fill in the hollow spaces on each side of the too-prominent
backbone of the desert horses, is at once novel and pleasing to the eye.

Other things likely to please the tourist are ostrich feathers and
eggs; the bolas and lassos used by the plainsmen of all kinds when
hunting; bows and arrows and spears of the Indians, and boots made of
the skin of a colt's hind legs. The ostrich feathers are gray, with a
little white mixed in, and are but little handsomer in their native
state than a turkey's feathers. Of course, they may be dyed and dressed
up by a competent worker.

Then there are shells of beautiful color and forms which the tourist can
gather for himself, together with feathery white seaweed, and, if he
have good luck, he may find in one of the perpendicular alluvial banks
which the people there call barrancas, something more interesting
still--the petrified remains of the kangaroo, the opossum, the monkey,
and possibly other and stranger forms of life that once roamed under a
tropical sky, where now the weather varies between that of a New York
day early in March and another very late in November. I saw an Italian
naturalist who had found the remains of two birds, which, he said, were
different from any birds ever yet discovered, and belonged to that
period of history when birds had teeth, and were just beginning to grow
feathers on their bat-like wings.

In making a collection of shells, the tourist would probably wonder how
it happened that a very pretty mussel shell found in New Gulf, Port
Desire, and the Straits of Magellan should be almost entirely absent at
Santa Cruz. And if he did not include an antediluvian oyster shell, say
fifteen inches long, in this collection, it would be for lack of room
and not because the bivalve was not interesting.

At Punta Arenas and at Ushuaia a new class of curios appears. Most
prominent are rugs of mingled otter skins, of seal fur, and swan's
down. The snow-white down beside the dark fur is so beautiful that few,
indeed, can resist the desire to buy in spite of the high prices asked.
A lovelier present for a dainty sweetheart could scarcely be imagined.

Though less beautiful, the basket woven from rushes by the Yahgan
Indians--a pearl-shaped affair to hold from two to four gallons--would
be more interesting to the tourist who is a naturalist. The arrow-heads
made by the Ona Indians of Tierra del Fuego from pieces of glass bottles
that have been cast over from Cape Horn ships are equally interesting.
The bows and arrows are not of a form to attract special attention,
except that the arrows are very light. One wonders how such a weapon
could pierce a guanaco or a lone prospector, as they are said to do.
That the arrow points are usually a genuine Indian product I presume
there is no doubt, though not necessarily Ona made, for the Tehuelches
of Patagonia can make a glass arrow-head. But one finds so many new bows
on sale at Punta Arenas, bows that show the mark of a jack-knife, too,
that a doubt is thrown over the whole collection.

The Onas, too, are continually at war with the whites. The two races go
hunting each other with considerable success on both sides. The whites,
of course, capture some bows and arrows, but they do not usually bring
them in as trophies. The whites of Tierra del Fuego are sheep herders or
gold diggers, who do not want to be bothered with such stuff. Besides,
bows from the battlefields are never new and clean, nor do they show
marks of a jack-knife.

Like the Eskimos of the west coast of Greenland, the Yahgans of the Cape
Horn region have learned that the whites will buy curios, and they
supply the market by making models of their canoes and weapons. At first
thought a model of either is an abomination to one who has a proper love
of specimens of aboriginal handicraft, but these models, if genuine, are
really good exhibits of what the Indians can do, and they are usually of
such perfect form as to portray, in a convenient form for handling, the
articles used by the natives in their daily lives. The weapons of full
size may readily be had--I saw offered for sale one spear reeking with
the blood of a bird the Indian had just slain, but in place of a canoe
the tourist may very well be content with a model.

Gold dust can be had at both Punta Arenas and Ushuaia, where Storekeeper
Figue of Ushuaia commonly has nuggets as well as dust. The Tierra del
Fuego gold is very pure, and the usual way of buying is to exchange a
British sovereign for its weight in dust--a very good trade for the
buyer.

The scenery along the Patagonia coast, and until one has passed the
first narrows in Magellan Strait, is not likely to please the ordinary
tourist. At every point one finds steep alluvial bluffs or rounded hills
and ridges, with wide arid mesas above and beyond that are of dull
colors and without variety. Nevertheless, there is something about the
desert that fascinates the lover of nature unmarred by human hands. What
it may be I cannot tell, but that it is always powerful and sometimes
irresistible I do not doubt. I saw men there who had travelled the world
over, had had the best of education, had enjoyed the luxuries of life in
civilized countries, and had the means of returning to them at any time,
but, nevertheless, could not shake off the spell. They were content to
live in a floorless mud hut, even in no shelter at all save that of a
clump of the thorny brush in some wild gulch, where their only
companions were the horses and dogs, with an occasional visit from one
like themselves or a family of ill-smelling Indians.

South from Punta Arenas, through Cockburn Channel and east through the
channels below Tierra del Fuego, the scenery is wholly different.
Snow-capped mountains rise out of the sea, barren and gray just below
the snow, and green with perpetual verdure for a thousand feet above the
water. There are black gulfs and inlets, and narrow channels that seem
to end abruptly, crags where the sea birds build their nests, gulches
and cañons where torrents come roaring and sprawling down. Elsewhere, as
told in the story of the Yahgans, there are rolling foot-hills with
green meadows among groves of trees that wave and flash in the sunlight
on a pleasant day.

There are glaciers that lie in hollows on the mountain side, and here
and there push little moraines before them in their heavy course down
the valleys to the water. A couple reach to the water's edge and throw
off tiny icebergs that go drifting about with the tide and wind. Better
yet, if one really loves nature, are the storms. Seen from a
sailing-vessel in danger of drifting on the rocks that are a hundred
leagues from help, the storms are fearsome; but when seen from the deck
of a well-found steamer, when wrapped in water-proofs and furs, they are
magnificent. The gale goes roaring up the mountain, carrying the snow in
fluffy masses to the very crest and hurls it thence in smoky, quivering
tongues, 1200 feet into the air. The same phenomenon may be seen on the
coast of Greenland, but in the Beagle Channel the mountains are nearer
at hand, their sides more precipitous, and the winds fiercer. And then
there are the "williwaws" the whalers tell about, the whirling squalls
that pick up the water, as the sand is picked up on the plains of New
Mexico to form writhing columns a thousand feet high. There is something
in the whizz and swish of wind and water, as one of these passes the
ship, that stirs the blood as nothing else in nature, short of a tornado
or live volcano, can do.

American art students go to Europe to complete their education by
copying old-time paintings of apostles--apostles standing erect in a
boat not large enough to accommodate their feet without pinching--and
then come home to gabble about the beauties of nature. The picture of a
saint, regardless of surroundings, may inspire the soul with religious
fervor and teach the struggling youth to put that fervor on the canvas,
but if one would paint a landscape that will at once thrill the soul
with terror and awake it to an appreciation of the wildest scene in
nature, let him make studies of the williwaws in the Cape Horn region,
with frozen volcanoes vomiting flames of snow for a background.

The _Ushuaia_ sailed out of Buenos Ayres on Wednesday, April 18th. She
arrived back on Saturday, June 23d. I should say there is probably no
other voyage in the world that a tourist could make in which he would
suffer more physical discomforts. The most of these as I saw them were
due to the wretched design of the remodelled lighter, but some were
inseparable from such a voyage because due to the climate and the
distance one goes from civilized communities.

Nevertheless, the liking for North Americans which the Argentines
everywhere professed, their hearty efforts to make me comfortable
because I was a North American, the delights of visiting the old-time
ports and waters of which one reads in the thrilling tales of early
exploration, these, with many other things that come to mind, combine to
crowd from the memory everything disagreeable, and I can think of the
voyage, as a whole, only with the greatest pleasure.




INDEX.


A

Aborigines of Cape Horn, story of, 47 _et seq._

"Adobe Money" depreciated, currency of Spanish-American nations, 279

_Adventures in Patagonia_, by Titus Coan, 154

Aguirre Bay (_see_ Spaniard Harbour).

Akers, Mr. C. E., author of _Argentine, Patagonian, and Chilian
Sketches_, 249

Alaculoof Indians, called Fuegians, 100;
  seen by early navigators, 128;
  home of, 134;
  described by early navigators, 134;
  story of aggressiveness of, 134 _et seq._;
  R. C. Mission to, 136

Alaska, reference to colony of outlaws in, 67

Albatross, white, seen off Staten Island, 141;
  enormous specimens of, in Patagonia, 209;
  eaten by early navigators, 209;
  superstition of sailors concerning, 209

_Allen Gardiner_ (_see_ Mission schooner).

Alluvial banks of Cape Horn region, 7-21, 295;
  beds of Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego, 64, 125;
  cliffs of New Gulf, 171, 268

American lion (_see_ Panther).

Andes, break in the, in Patagonia, at Gallegos River, 125, 282;
  in Tierra del Fuego, from San Sebastian to Useless Bay, 125

Animals, found in Patagonia, 184 _et seq._, 194-200;
  of the desert, able to live without water, 200

Anson, Admiral, description of land of the Yahgans by, 49

Ansorge, Herr Bruno, gold miner at Paramo, 14;
  found bit of gold ore, 22;
  member of singing club, 267

Antarctic Highlanders (_see_ Yahgans).

Archipelago of Cape Horn, 47

_Arctic_, S. S., wrecked on Cape Virgin, 6

Arenas, Punta (_see_ under Punta).

Argentine, Capital (_see_ Ushuaia).

Argentine, Government sends engineer to gold region of Patagonia, 7;
  establishes settlement at Ushuaia, fearing Chilian encroachment,
      101 _et seq._, 108;
  grants land to Mr. Bridges, 121;
  transport _Ushuaia_ sails for Staten Island, 138 (_see Ushuaia_);
  generous to Welsh colonists, 174 _et seq._;
  depressed condition of currency of, 221;
  hospitality shown on pampas of, 256;
  naval transports of, 260;
  great consumption of _maté_ in, 271;
  prepares Santa Cruz as base of operations, 276;
  Lake, traces of gold at, 278;
  land system discourages small owners, 280;
  connected with other lakes by navigable channels, 280;
  population on border line of, friendly to Chili, 282;
  difficulty of obtaining justice in, 282

_Argentine, Patagonian, and Chilian Sketches_, by Mr. C. E. Akers, 249

Armadillo, prey of panther, 195;
  two varieties of, 198;
  interesting habits of, 198 _et seq._;
  methods of killing snakes, 199;
  delicious article of food, 199;
  not found south of Santa Cruz River, 199;
  grubs for worms, 199;
  methods of catching mice, 199;
  robs nests, 199;
  suggestion as to importation of, into United States, 200

Arms, Mr., sent to Patagonia with Rev. Mr. Coan, 154

Asado, or beef roasting, by gauchos, 229

Asses' Ears, point of New Island, 16, 17

Axes, of Yahgans, shell, 57-59 (_see_ Yahgans).


B

Baccarat, favorite game in Punta Arenas, 44

Backhausen, Herr Carlos, gold miner at Paramo, 14

Bala College, 169

Banner Cove (_see_ Picton Island).

Baptists at Frondrey, 177

Barrancas, vertical earth banks, 21;
  perpendicular alluvial banks, 295

Bars, number of licensed, in Punta Arenas, 40

Beagle Channel, _Ushuaia_ in, 15;
  ranch of Mr. Bridges on, 62;
  milder climate of, 117;
  charming scenery, 117;
  profits of ranching on, 119, 122;
  market for products, 120, 138

Beech, Antarctic, trees of Fuegian Islands, 50

Beer made at Quilmes, 244

Bell snake, gaucho term for rattlesnake, 246

Benfield, Mr. Theo., story of wonderful find by, 21 _et seq._

Berberis, berry of thorn bush, 76;
  medicinal decoction of, 134

Big Feet, name given to Tehuelches, 173

Birds, of Patagonia, 201-214;
  interesting to sportsmen, 206;
  interesting to naturalists, 208;
  in North Patagonia migrate farther south, 210;
  thirteen Arctic varieties of, migrate to Patagonia, 210;
  and insects, 173

Bolas, weapons used by Ona Indians, 59;
  "the lost," used by Tehuelche Indians, 164;
  used in hunting panthers, 194;
  how to make them, 235;
  how to use them, 235;
  effective weapons, 235

Bongos, canoes of Bay of Panama, 55

Bougainville, M., 150;
  French explorer, 260

Bows and arrows, weapons of Onas, 129, 296;
  weapons of Tehuelches, 164, 296

Brecknock Pass, 15

Bridges, Rev. Thomas, describes Yahgan canoes, 55;
  compiles grammar of Yahgan language, 62;
  descriptions of Yahgan character, 66;
  descriptions of Yahgan cooking, 76;
  first arrival at Keppel Island, 85;
  learns Yahgan language, 87;
  becomes a missionary, 90;
  labors among Yahgans, 91;
  reports condition of Ushuaia, 93 _et seq._;
  method of solving Hidugalahgoon's matrimonial troubles, 94;
  picture of life at the station, 97;
  turns ranchman, 118;
  home of, on Beagle Channel, 118;
  family of, 119;
  profits of ranching, 119;
  how ranch was obtained, 120;
  extract of lecture in Buenos Ayres, 121;
  charges against, 122;
  land of, belonged to Yahgans, 124;
  safe journey of, through Ona country, 133

Buenos Ayres, excitement in, over gold discoveries, 8;
  Mr. Bridges lectures in, 120;
  Mentions of, "the Athens of South America," 248, 252;
  _Ushuaia_ starts from, 261;
  hard biscuit of, 275;
  _Ushuaia_ returns to, 299

Bunch Grass, 178;
  seed, 157;
  eaten by Indians and gauchos, 238

Burleigh, Rev. Mr., at mission station, Tekenika Bay, 104

Button, Jemmy, a Yahgan, taken to England by Darwin, 62;
  goes to Keppel Island, 85;
  conduct towards his fellows, 99


C

Cabbages, size of, at Ushuaia, 115;
  grown at Punta Arenas, 289

Cape Horn (_see_ Horn).

Cape Virgin (_see_ Virgin).

Canoes of Yahgans, 54-57

Caramba, use of the word, 231

Caranchos, species of vulture, 162;
  abundant, 212;
  aid panther hunters, 213

Carmen de Patagones, Spanish colony on Rio Negro, 152;
  paid tribute to natives, 152

Cattle and sheep raising conducive to over-hospitality, 254 _et seq._

Celery, wild, found in Fuego, a delicate vegetable, 49

Centenera, Del Barco, Spanish writer, 192

Channels, labyrinthian, of Cape Horn, 25

Cheenah, Indian squaw, 147 _et seq._

Chico River, 280

Chili, takes possession of Port Famine and the Straits of Magallanes, 27;
  renames Port Famine, 28;
  depressed condition of currency of, 221;
  justice to be had in, 282

Chiloé, island of, 4

Chisels, wooden, 59 (_see_ Yahgans).

Chubut, Welsh colony settled at, 168;
  hardships of colony at, 171 _et seq._;
  foes of the desert, 173;
  area and population of, 177;
  railroad constructed from, to New Gulf, 179, 269;
  Welsh colony of, 252;
  tramp element in Welsh colony of, 256

Chubut River, 33, 168, 173

Chwaites, II. V., Captain of the _Ushuaia_, 263, 285;
  a fine sportsman, 288;
  hunting guanacos with bolas, 288

Clark, Mr. William, ranchman at Gallegos, 225, 256 _et seq._

Climate of Cape Horn region, 23;
  of Punta Arenas, 46, 91;
  of land of Yahgans, 49, 53;
  12° below zero the coldest, 52;
  of Gallegos, peculiarity of, 286

Coan, Rev. Mr. Titus, theological student, 154;
  sent to Patagonia, 154;
  experiences in, 154;
  author of _Adventures in Patagonia_, 154;
  found runaway sailors among Tehuelches, 258

Cockburn Channel, 15, 47;
  scenery of, 298

Colonia de Magallanes, La, or Port Famine, 27;
  nicknamed Sandy Point, 28 _et seq._;
  penal colony established at, 28;
  prison burned, 33

Colony, Welsh (_see_ under Welsh).

Condors, size of, 212;
  aids to panther hunters, 213

Cook, Captain, describes land of the Yahgans, 49;
  wild celery, 49;
  sailors of, find albatross good eating, 209;
  early navigator, 260

Coots found on Chubut River, 173

Cordilleras, wild cattle hunting in, 31;
  snow-capped peaks of, 34, 224;
  Gallegos River rises in, 282

Cormorants found in Patagonia, 208

Coypu, hunted for fur, good eating, 197;
  aquatic 'possum, or species of beaver, 197;
  peculiar formation of, 197

Cripple Creek, 140

Cruz, Santa, River (_see_ under Santa).

Cuerpo de Bomberos, gambling club in Punta Arenas, 44

Curios to be found in Patagonia, 43, 293-297

Currency of Argentina and Chili, depressed condition of, 221;
  value of gold and paper, 222


D

Darwin, Sound, 15;
  Mt., peak of coast range on Tierra del Fuego, 47

Darwin, Charles, the naturalist, describes Yahgans, 62;
  takes Jemmy Button to England, 62;
  explores Santa Cruz River, 169;
  opinion of Patagonia, 183;
  misstatements concerning guanacos, 185;
  mentions black-faced Ibises, 211

Dandelions thrive in the desert, 157

Deer, found in forests of Andes, 198;
  destroy desert snakes, 198

Denominational churches in Welsh colony, 177

Deserts of Patagonia, 157;
  inhospitable region, 157;
  springs far apart, 157;
  well adapted to guanacos and ostriches, 157;
  foes of the, 173;
  bushes of the, 183, 232;
  snakes of, destroyed by deer, 198;
  similar to desert regions of United States, 199;
  armadilloes thrive in, 199;
  animals of, able to live without water, 200;
  ostrich hunting in, 204 _et seq._;
  silence of the, 212, 232;
  fascination of, 227, 232;
  sparrow of the, 232

Desire, Port (_see_ under Port).

Desolation Bay, 15

Diaz, Don Rui, Spanish Captain, 192

_Dido_, S. S., sent to Spaniard Harbour, 84

Dragon fly, called "the son of the southwest gale," 246

Ducks, uncounted hosts at Cape Horn, 75;
  enormous quantities at Staten Island, 140;
  near Chubut, 173;
  prey of panther, 195;
  curiosity of wild, 206;
  shooting too easy, 206;
  quantities of, in interior, 207;
  favorite breeding places, 208;
  curious air dance of, 212;
  color and curiosity of, off Santa Cruz, 288

Dugouts, canoes used in Caribbean Sea, 55


E

Eggs, methods of gathering, 68;
  methods of cooking, 76, 238;
  panthers eat, 195; ostrich, 202;
  size of ostrich, 238

Elephants formerly existed in Patagonia, 157

Elizabeth Island, sheep thrive on, 31

El Paramo (_see_ Paramo).

_Endeavor_, Captain Cook's ship, 209

Eskimos, Yahgans compared with, 49

Extradition treaty between Chili and Argentine of little value, 286


F

Fables of Tehuelches, 159 (_see_ Tehuelches).

Falkland Islands, 27, 150, 222

Famine, Port (_see_ under Port Famine).

Farina, a ground root, 222

Fauna of Patagonia, 68, 75, 76, 83, 140, 157, 173, 183, 184 _et seq._,
194 _et seq._, 198-200, 206 _et seq._, 212, 288

_Felis Concolor_ (_see_ Panther).

Ferns, 45

Figue, Adolph and Louis, merchants at Ushuaia, 22, 115, 297

Fish, native methods of catching, 59, 60;
  sea filled with, 75, 83

Fitzroy, Captain, 67, 73, 81

Flints and agates abound in the Ona country, 132

Flora of Patagonia, 11, 43, 45, 49, 50, 68, 75, 76, 83, 115, 157, 178, 183,
200, 222, 238, 289

Flores Island, quarantine station of Uruguay, 228

Flowers in great profusion in Punta Arenas, 45

Fossil, mastodon's jaw, 21;
  of opossum, kangaroo, and monkey, 64;
  in Tierra del Fuego, 125;
  of glyptodon, 201, 295

Fox, gray, flourishes in Patagonia, 198

"Friend of Man," gaucho term for panther, 246

Frondrey, village of, 177

Fruits, small, 76

Fuegians (_see_ Alaculoof).

Fuegian Islands, mountains of, 50

Fuego, Tierra del, 7;
  placer gold found on, 1, 7, 22;
  explored by Popper, 9;
  Bay of Port Pantaloons in, 17;
  peaks of coast range on, 47;
  magnificent vegetation of, 49;
  prairies of, 124;
  climate and fertility of, 124;
  size and shape of island, 125;
  contrast to Patagonia, 125;
  bones of animals found in, 125;
  rainfall and frosts of, 125;
  sheep raising introduced into, 126;
  the industry spreads, 127;
  three Argentine stations in, 127;
  origin of name, 128;
  ships wrecked on, 254;
  Ona Indians of, 296;
  scenery through channels of, 298

Fungus, yellow, vegetable food, 75, 157;
  eaten by Indians and gauchos, 238

Fuschias, 45

Future Bay, near Punta Arenas, 10


G

Gable Island, in Beagle Channel, 62;
  sheep ranch of Mr. Bridges on, 118

Gallegos, successful sheep raising in, 216;
  ranchmen at, 224 _et seq._;
  description of ranchmen, 225;
  game of cards, corn kernels for chips, 225;
  ordinance against tramps in, 255;
  the capital of Santa Cruz territory, 281;
  location of, 281;
  buildings of, like a Yankee mining camp 283;
  good cattle country back of, 283;
  placer gold mines along coast south of, 283;
  size of the capital city, 283;
  unattractive appearance of, 283;
  every store a hotel, 284;
  hotels compared with those of Mexico, 284;
  queer boarding-house in, 284 _et seq._;
  Doña Philomela, the hostess, 284;
  occasional arrests and trials in, 286;
  government officials of, 286;
  Captain of Police in, a cripple, 286;
  peculiar climate of, 286;
  high winds in, 286;
  winter the pleasantest season, 287

Gallegos River, 14, 16;
  probably a strait in former ages, 125;
  volcanic mountain peak south of, 157;
  parrots found at the heads of, 213;
  population between Santa Cruz River and, friendly to Chili, 282;
  rises in Cordilleras near Pacific Ocean, 282;
  size of, 282;
  navigable, 282;
  lava beds, 282 _et seq._;
  perfect pasture land along, 283;
  lands south, filled with shepherds, 283;
  lack of fuel on north side of, 283;
  Captain Chwaites hunts the guanaco with bolas, 288

Galletas, bullet-like loaves of bread, 241

Gardiner, Captain Allen Francis, R. N., first missionary to
      Fuegian Indians, 80;
  attempt to live among Yahgans fails, 81;
  fits out launches in England and returns to Tierra del Fuego, 82

Gauchos, or cowboys, 33;
  methods of fox hunting, 198;
  methods of ostrich hunting, 205;
  methods of hunting prairie chickens, 208;
  definition of the word, 228;
  resemble Nantucket whalers, 229;
  peculiar dress of, 230;
  in the wilderness, 231;
  reasons for becoming 233;
  wild life fascinating to all men, 233 _et seq._;
  blankets and fur robes used by, 233, 235;
  the ways and manners of, 234;
  dress of, 234;
  outfit of, inexpensive, 234;
  weapons of, 235;
  methods of fighting, 236;
  wild life of, 236 _et seq._;
  usual breakfast of, 236 _et seq._;
  superb riders, 237;
  method of cooking ostrich eggs, 238;
  fat of panther most satisfying food, 238;
  appetite of, 238 _et seq._;
  meat diet alone not satisfying, 238;
  as seen by travellers, 239;
  ways of spending money, 239;
  enjoyment of "jags," 239;
  pride of, 240;
  dangerous to insult, 240;
  etiquette of smoking, 240;
  branding cattle, 241;
  powers of endurance, 241;
  description of house of, 242;
  manner of eating, 242 _et seq._;
  home life of, 243;
  amusements of, 243;
  cheating at cards counted a mark of superior skill by, 243;
  description of saloons, 244;
  native drinks, 244 _et seq._;
  liquor glasses, 244;
  etiquette of drinking, 245;
  _maté_ tea making, 245;
  character of, 246 _et seq._;
  terms and sayings of, 246 _et seq._;
  religion of, 247;
  compared with North American cowboys, 247 _et seq._;
  enjoyment of life, 248

Geese, myriads of, 75;
  prey of panther, 195;
  beautiful colors of wild, 207;
  two varieties of wild, 207;
  good sport, 207;
  favorite breeding places of, 208

Gente Grande Bay, rich pastures of, 126;
  introduction and spread of sheep raising in, 126 _et seq._

Glyptodons, fossil remains of, 201

Gold, first discoveries of, on Patagonian coast, 1-5;
  sailors wrecked at Cape Virgin, 4;
  story of, 5;
  bearing banks of Cape Horn region, 7;
  rich finds of, at New Island, 16 _et seq._;
  at Port Pantaloons, 17;
  marvellous quality of, at Sloggett Bay, 20;
  peculiar difficulties of mining in Sloggett Bay, 21;
  on New Year's Island, 150;
  found in Welsh colony, 178;
  traces of, at Lake Argentine, 278

Gold diggings, story of, 2-4, 7;
  at Cape Virgin worked out, 10;
  further explorations, 10;
  at Paramo, richness of, 12 _et seq._;
  supply renewed after storms and spring tides, 13;
  ore found in a bit of drift rock, 22;
  no quartz veins in Cape Horn region, 22;
  miners at work between Gallegos and Cape Virgin, 283;
  dust obtained at Punta Arenas and Ushuaia, 297

Gnats (_see_ Punkies).

Grand Chaco forests of the Argentine, 228

Greenwood, Mr. W. H., 193

Grey, Mr. H., Yankee merchant, 30

Grubb, Mr. W. Balbrooke, school teacher at Keppel Island, 88

Guanaco, hunted, 31;
  red-haired, 51;
  modified camel, 64, 75;
  how hunted by Onas, 129;
  first view of, 184;
  habits of, 184;
  description of, 184 _et seq._;
  Darwin's observations of, 185, 186;
  curious habits of, 185, 186, 189;
  wallowing places of, 187;
  methods of self-defence, 187;
  vast herds of, 188;
  sense of smell and curiosity of, 188, 195;
  sure footed, 189;
  pleasing pets when young, 189;
  flesh good eating, 190;
  mainstay of Indian, 190;
  hides valuable, 190;
  price of skins of, 190;
  medicinal quality of ball in stomach of, 190;
  the staple food of panther, 195;
  beautiful fur of, 293;
  skins used for beds, 294;
  price of skins of, 294

Gulf of St. George, 293

Gulls of Cape Horn, 75;
  tiny species off Staten Island, 141;
  called Cape Horn pigeon, 208

_Guy Mannering_ wrecked off Staten Island, 144


H

Hamilton, James, D.D., _Memoir of Richard Williams_, by, 84;
  John, 215;
  sheep raiser in Patagonia, 280

Hansen, Harry, gold prospector, 15

Hermit Island, gold-bearing banks on, 7;
  a few Yahgans left on, 72, 78

Hidugalahgoon, matrimonial difficulties of, 94

Hope, Point, in Alaska, 77

Horn, Cape, gold-bearing banks on, 7;
  first view of mine camp at, 9;
  miners of, 24;
  labyrinthian channels of region of, 25;
  metropolis of, 27;
  archipelago, 47;
  story of aborigines of, 47 _et seq._;
  mission, 79;
  region, snow storms every month in the year, 91, 125;
  pigeons, species of gull, 208;
  beauty of pigeons, 209;
  Indians of, eat penguins, 209

Horse meat, great delicacy to Onas and Tehuelches, 129

Hospitality, unbounded, in the Argentine pampas and Patagonia ranches, 256

Hudson, Mr. W. H., author of _Naturalist in La Plata_,186

Hummingbirds, 214


I

Ibañez (Gregorio), Don, Argentine sailor, wrecked on Cape Virgin, 4;
  finds gold, 5

Ibises, black-faced, song and dance of, 211 _et seq._

Indians, attack explorers at San Sebastian Bay, 11;
  trade with, 43;
  squaw in tailor-made gown, 44;
  three tribes of, in Cape Horn Archipelago, 74 _et seq._;
  nomads of Patagonia (_see_ Tehuelche), 151 _et seq._;
  make use of all parts of guanacos, 190;
  of Patagonia eat skunks, 198;
  make pets of skunks, 198;
  of Cape Horn region eat penguins, 209;
  vegetable food of, 238

Insects, varieties of, 173, 183

Iron ore found on one island only, 76


J

Jones, Mr. Lewis, 169

Jones, Dr. Michael, founder of Welsh colony at Chubut, 169;
  wishes to perpetuate Welsh language, 181;
  Spanish the language of the Argentine, 182

Journey, alongshore in Cape Horn region, 15;
  begun, 260 _et seq._;
  departure from Buenos Ayres, 261;
  life on board _Ushuaia_, 261-268;
  prevailing winds, 268;
  arrival at New Gulf, 268;
  attractive telegraph operator, 269;
  _en route_ for Port Desire, 269;
  captain's confidence, 270;
  view of Port Desire disappointing, 270;
  description of Port Desire, 271;
  visit to the Sub-Prefect, 273;
  dinner with a ranchman, 275;
  arrival at Santa Cruz, 276;
  town consists of nine buildings, 277;
  plan of city, 278;
  arrival at Gallegos, 281;
  unattractiveness of Gallegos, 283 _et seq._;
  one clean hotel, 284;
  introduced to Gov. Mayer, 285;
  discomforts on the _Ushuaia_, 288-291;
  interesting curios to be collected, 293-297;
  return to Buenos Ayres, 299;
  pleasant memories of, 300;
  (_see_ also under Staten Island).


K

Kangaroo, petrified remains of, 64, 157

Kayaks, canoes of Eskimos, 55

Keppel Island, mission station established on, 85;
  preparatory school of the mission, 87

Kevalinyes, the, of Point Hope, 67

King, Mr., describes magnificent vegetation in land of Yahgans, 49

Knives, weapons of Tehuelches, 164;
  price of, used by gauchos, 235;
  useful at meal times, 242;
  murderous weapons, 248;
  size of, 275


L

Lagoons of Rio Gallegos, 211

Lake Nehuel-Huapi, 164

Land of Yahgans, 49-52

Lapwings, spurwinged, dance quadrilles, 210;
  description of the dancing, 210 _et seq._

Lassoes, used by Tehuelches and gauchos, 164;
  description of, horsehair rope, 235

Lava beds at Santa Cruz, 217

Lawrence, Rev. John, Yahgan canoes described by, 55, 78;
  children of, continue mission work, 104 _et seq._

Le Maire, Straits of, 15;
  _Ushuaia_ in, 138;
  strong currents, and tide rips in, 139

Lennox Island, gold-bearing banks on, 7;
  same formation of bank and beach as at Cape Virgin, 16;
  harbour, 85

Lezama, Don Gregorio, organizes expedition to gold diggings, 8

Lichens, 45

Lignite, found in Punta Arenas, 42;
  found in Welsh colony, 178

Lista, Don Ramon, Argentine explorer and writer, 4, 120;
  collects Tehuelche tales, 159

Literati of Yahgan tribe, 65

Locusts, pests of the desert, 173

Lucia, Stephen, 94


M

Madryn, Welsh town in Patagonia, 180;
  on New Gulf, 251;
  captain of the port of, 251

Magellan's search for shorter route to Spice Islands, 2;
  visited St. Julian Harbor in Patagonia, 151, 260

Magellan, Straits of, placer gold in streams flowing into, 22;
  bleak pictures of, given by early navigators, 34;
  Cape Horn Archipelago south of, 47;
  Chilian possessions in, 276;
  narrows in, 297

Magnolia trees, size of, in Fuegian Islands, 50

Maidment, Mr., catechist, 82

Maldonada, Señorita, story of, and panther, 192

Mammals, 83

"Mañana country," Spanish American nations so called, 279

Manufacturing industries of Punta Arenas, 42

Maria, Santa (_see_ under Santa).

Marriages of Yahgans (_see_ Yahgans).

Marshall, storekeeper at Chubut, 178

_Maté_, wild tea of Paraguay, 237;
  drinking, 245 _et seq._ (_see_ Gaucho);
  great consumption of, in Argentine, 271;
  meat and drink to Patagonians, 272

Mayer, Edelmiro, Governor of Patagonian territory of Santa Cruz, 215;
  large land owners along Santa Cruz and Chico rivers, 280;
  Governor of Gallegos, 285;
  description of home of, 285;
  devoted to music and literature, 285;
  wife of, 286;
  commanded a negro regiment in War of the Rebellion, 286;
  helped Mexicans overthrow Maximilian, 286

Mesa, plains of Patagonia, 183, 187

Meteorological condition of islands, 51

Methodists at Rawson, 177

Minas, Las, creek near Punta Arenas, 4;
  gold found in large quantity, 5;
  enormous nuggets, 6

Mine camps at Paramo and Ushuaia small affairs, 23, 24

Miners of Cape Horn, headquarters of, at Punta Arenas, 24;
  cost of outfit of, 24.

Misery, Mount, on Navarin Island, 51

Mission school at Keppel Island, 89;
  first station of Cape Horn, 79;
  on Beagle Channel, 89, 100;
  growth of, 100 _et seq._

Mission, schooner, _Allen Gardiner_, 89;
  built in England, 85;
  commanded by Capt. W. P. Snow, 85;
  steamship to replace schooner, 100;
  Roman Catholic, established near San Sebastian Bay, 133;
  in country of the Alaculoofs, 136

Missionaries, to Yahgans, spiritual teachings of, 66, 71, 99;
  land at Picton Island, 82;
  miserable death of, 85;
  second party of, arrive at Keppel Island, 85;
  some murdered by Yahgans, 86;
  are reinforced, 87 _et seq._;
  station at Ushuaia founded, 89;
  Mr. Bridges in charge, 90 _et seq._;
  material teachings of, 90-98;
  extracts from records of, 93-100, 102, 103;
  natives receive scant pay from, 95 _et seq._;
  unhappy transformation of tribe into laborers, 101 _et seq._;
  tribe dies out, 105;
  Mr. Bridges turns ranchman, 118 _et seq._;
  sell clothing sent to be given to Indians, 122;
  opportunities for trade, 123;
  reasons for so doing, 123;
  salaries of, 123

Missiones, 229

Mojave, desert of, 23

Monkeys, fossil remains of, 64.

Morrell, Captain Benjamin, tales of aborigines by, 153 _et seq._

Mosquitoes numerous in Patagonia, 173, 183

Mount Misery (_see_ Misery).

Mount Sarmiento (_see_ Sarmiento).

Mountains, snow-capped, 23;
  possible gold veins in, 23;
  difficulties of ascent of, 23;
  precipitous, of Fuegian Islands, 50;
  covered with forests of beech and magnolias, 50;
  sea mosses above tree line, 51;
  eternal snows, 51

Mouse, prey of panther, 195

Mouse-bird (_see_ desert sparrow).

Musters, George Chaworth, Commander, 4


N

_Naturalist in La Plata_, by Mr. W. H. Hudson, 186

Navarin Island, gold-bearing banks on, 7;
  rolling hills, meadows and groves on, 51;
  murder of some of the missionaries on, 86;
  climate near, 117

Negro, Rio, Spanish colony, 152 (_see_ Carmen de Patagones);
  parrots found in region of, 213;
  valley and ranches of, 250, 254, 256

Nehuel-Huapi, Lake, apple orchards on, 164

New Gulf, in Patagonia, Welsh land at, 170;
  plenty of gypsum at, 172;
  first view of Patagonian tramp at Madryn on, 251;
  _Ushuaia_ arrives at, 268;
  first view of, 268;
  attractive telegraph operator in, 269

New Island, gold-bearing banks on, 7;
  extraordinary finds at, 16 _et seq._

New Year's Island, north of Staten Island, 18, 140;
  gold on, 148, 150

Nomads of Patagonia, the Tehuelches, 151 _et seq._

Nugget weighing 300 grammes found at Las Minas, 6


O

_Ocean Queen_, S. S., 82

Ona Indians, of Tierra del Fuego, 59;
  weapons and implements of, 59, 60;
  efforts to civilize and teach them sheep raising, 126;
  flock to ranch, but steal sheep at night, 126;
  a distinct race, 127;
  children used as servants in Argentine Government families, 127;
  cause of name Tierra del Fuego, 128;
  land tribe, 128;
  slight mention of, by early explorers, 128;
  same origin as Tehuelches, 129;
  fine runners, 129;
  have no boats, but are found in Patagonia, 129;
  have no horses, 129;
  weapons of, 129;
  language of, harsh, 129, 132;
  food of, 129;
  methods of hunting, 129;
  homes of, 130;
  no lack of intelligence, 130;
  migratory habits, 130;
  beard plucking, 131;
  personal appearance of, 131;
  habits of, 131;
  capacity for food, 131 _et seq._;
  methods of lighting fires, 132;
  making of weapons, 132;
  religious beliefs of, unknown, 132;
  cruelty of, towards whites, 132;
  cannibals, 133;
  medicinal remedy discovered by, 134;
  glass arrow-heads of, 296;
  frequent fights with shepherds and gold diggers of Tierra del Fuego, 296

Oomiaks, canoes of Eskimos, 55

Opossum, fossil remains of, 64;
  thrives in treeless Patagonia, 196;
  does not lose climbing instinct, 196;
  family of, transported to a plantation with trees, 196;
  different species of, 197

Ostriches, fossil remains of, 64, 201;
  desert peculiarly adapted to, 157;
  prey of panther, 195;
  foes of, 201;
  two kinds of, in Patagonia, 201;
  angular gait of, 201;
  not such fools as reported, 202;
  hiding their heads in the sand a real safeguard, 202;
  color of sand and desert bushes, 203;
  reasons for survival of, 202;
  flies and grasshoppers the food of, 202;
  nest built by male, 202;
  brood cared for by male, 202;
  danger signal of male, 202;
  learn habits of their hunters, 203;
  easily domesticated, 204;
  will flock to a place of safety from great distances, 204;
  hunting, glorious sport, 204;
  appearance of different varieties when pursued, 204 _et seq._;
  will run from a gun two miles away, 204;
  savage traits of the cocks, 204;
  Indian method of capturing, 205;
  appearance of white one at Carmen de Patagones, 206;
  taken with the bolas, 205;
  eggs and flesh of, good eating, 206;
  value of feathers of, 239

Otten, Fred, 6

Otters found at Cape Horn, 75

Outlaws, colony of, on Siberian coast, 67


P

Panther, also called American lion, 173;
  description of, 190 _et seq._;
  characteristics of, 191 _et seq._;
  story of a, 191 _et seq._;
  hunting, 193;
  war of extermination against, 193;
  habits of, when pursued, 193; _et seq._;
  how eaten in Patagonia, 194;
  hunting habits of the, 194;
  food of, 195;
  wiliness of, 195;
  wanton destructiveness of, 195;
  instinctive dislike to dogs, 196;
  charming household pet, 196;
  fat most satisfying food of the desert, 238

Paramo, El, meaning of name, 9;
  founded by Popper, 9;
  first mine camp established at, 9;
  arrival of supplies for camp at, 11;
  description of camp, 12;
  grassy plains and treeless hills, 12;
  richness of gold bed on beach at, 12 _et seq._;
  gold bed renewed by storms, 13;
  methods of washing gold, 14;
  land in, controlled by German-Argentine corporation, 14;
  Argentine military station, 127

Parrots, fossil remains of, 157;
  found in forests of Andes, 213

Partridge, prey of panther, 190

Patagonia, 2;
  description of, 5;
  engineer sent to, by Argentine Government, 7;
  thousand miles of gold vein on coast of, 15;
  nomads of, 151 _et seq._;
  desert east of Andes, 152;
  Jesuits plant apples in, 152;
  Spanish colonies attempted, 152;
  Mr. Coan and Mr. Arms in, 154;
  condition of, in 1865, 169;
  grant of land in, to Welsh, 169;
  Welsh pilgrims land at New Gulf, 169 _et seq._;
  winter season in, 170;
  dreary surroundings of Welsh colonists in, 170 _et seq._;
  gypsum and alkali, 171;
  Welsh colonists make homes, 172;
  "Big Feet," 173 (_see_ Tehuelches);
  transportation difficult, 179;
  railway constructed, 179;
  new towns, 179;
  railway prospered, 180;
  railway building not expensive, 181;
  zoölogy of, 183;
  natives of, consume fat like Eskimos, 194;
  panther an esteemed article of diet in, 194;
  home of panthers and 'possums, 196;
  interesting characteristics of zoölogy of, 200;
  resembles desert regions of United States, 200;
  varieties of animals found in, 194-200;
  desert animals of, able to live without water, 200;
  birds of, 201 _et seq._;
  birds interesting to sportsmen, 206 _et seq._;
  birds interesting to naturalists, 208 _et seq._;
  thirteen Arctic varieties of birds migrate to, 210;
  birds of north, migrate farther south, 210;
  silence of desert, 212;
  sheep raising successful in, 216;
  stories of successful ranchmen in, 216;
  well watered, 219;
  description of a ranch in, 222;
  ranchmen of, 226;
  extent of prairie and desert region in, 228;
  description of prairies and deserts, 232;
  wild horses of the plains of, 236;
  tramps in, 250;
  trackless deserts of, 250;
  hospitality in ranches of, 256;
  astonishing number of tramps in, 259;
  natives of, prefer _maté_ to all else, 272;
  Santa Cruz the planned metropolis of, 278;
  Gallegos the capital of, 279;
  settlements small, but slow healthy growth, in, 287;
  healthful region, 287;
  most valuable product of native industry, 293;
  squaws make guanaco skin robes, 294;
  weave guanaco hair into blankets, 294;
  scenery along coast of, 297;
  fascination of the desert, 297

Penguins, numerous, 75;
  rapid movements of, 141;
  fly through water, 209;
  not eaten by Patagonians, 209;
  eagerly pursued by Cape Horn Indians, 209

Phillips, Mr. Garland, catechist, 85, 86

Philomena, Doña, boarding-house keeper in Gallegos, 284

Picton Island, missionaries landed at Banner Cove in, 82;
  story of failure to establish mission on, 82 _et seq._;
  death of missionaries, 84;
  relief ship arrives at, 84

Pigeons, Cape Horn, species of gull, 141;
  description of, 208 _et seq._

Placer gold diggings on Patagonian coast, 3;
  gold found in all the streams of Tierra del Fuego, 22;
  gold mines along coast south of Gallegos, 283

Plate River, 228, 261, 290

_Poco Tiempo_, land of Spanish-American nations, 279

Point Hope, in Alaska, 67

Poncho, Indian blanket worn by gauchos, 234;
  woven by Indian squaws, 294;
  not equal in beauty to work of Indians of Guatemala, 294;
  used for wraps and saddle blankets, 294

Popper, Herr Julius, founder of El Paramo, 9;
  murder of, 10;
  describes Punta Arenas, 46;
  finds gold in San Sebastian Bay, 120

Port Desire, on Patagonian coast, 27;
  Spanish colony, 152;
  volcanic bluffs at, 157;
  discovered by Cavendish, 169;
  ibises of, 211;
  condors of, 212;
  ancient resort of pirates, 269;
  view of, disappointing, 270;
  Tower Rock, 270;
  description of, 271;
  life in, 271 _et seq._;
  no lack of food in, 271;
  luxuries depend upon visits of transports, 271 _et seq._;
  story of sub-prefect of, 272;
  story of Lieut. Wilson's servant, 273;
  life of naval officers in, 273;
  ruins of Spanish fort in, 274;
  visit to home of a ranchman, 274;
  interesting dinner, 275

Port Famine, ancient port, 27;
  Chili took possession of, 27;
  penal colony of Chili, 28;
  buildings of, destroyed by convicts, 28;
  colony re-established farther north, 28

Port Pantaloons, Bay of, on Tierra del Fuego, 17;
  description of scenery at, 17;
  gold found at, 17

Port St. Julian, Spanish colony, 152

Potatoes, at Ushuaia, 115;
  at Punta Arenas, 289

Potro boots, worn by gauchos, 234

Prairie chickens, easily unnerved by noise, 208;
  simulate death, 208;
  often frightened to death, 208;
  two varieties of, 208;
  good shooting and eating, 208;
  home of, 208

Prairie dog, prey of panther, 196

Prospectors, gold, difficulties of, 15, 23;
  model of sloop of, 24;
  food supply of, 25;
  long absences of, 25

Puchero, beef stew, on the _Ushuaia_, 262

Puerta San Juan del Salvamiento (_see_ St. John Bay), 143

Puma, foe of the ostrich, 201

Punkies, gnats, 183

Punta Arenas, or Sandy Point, 2;
  Commander Musters stops at, 4;
  Don Ramon Lista visits, 4;
  inhabitants excited by gold discoveries, 6;
  supply station for sealing schooners, 7;
  headquarters of gold miners, 24;
  story of foundation of, 27 _et seq._;
  development of colony of, 29 _et seq._;
  elements of growth, 30;
  industry of sheep raising begun, 31;
  mutiny in, 32 _et seq._;
  miserable end of mutineers, 33;
  latitude of, 33;
  arrival of _Ushuaia_ at, 33;
  appearance of, in May, 33, 34;
  description of town, 34 _et seq._;
  gambling and dance houses, 36 _et seq._;
  government of Chili nominally republican, but ruled by army, 39, 40;
  bars in, 40;
  description of women in, 40;
  sidewalks in, 40;
  Governor's residence, 41;
  scenery about, 41;
  coal discovered in, 42;
  brick making in, 42;
  possibilities of, 43;
  region rich in tan bark, 43;
  trade with Indians, 43;
  goods delivered by sailboats, 43;
  Indian squaws make rugs, baskets, etc., in, 44;
  Cuerpo de Bomberos gambling club in, 44;
  profusion of flowers in, 45;
  population of, 45;
  future prosperity of, 46;
  profits of sheep raising in, 219;
  fate of escaped convicts from, 213;
  tramps from, 254;
  vegetables grown in, 282, 289;
  price of guanaco-skin robes in, 293;
  curios to be found at, 295 _et seq._;
  gold dust obtained at, 297;
  scenery south of, 298


Q

Quillango, fur robe, 233;
  worn by gauchos, 235

Quilmes, near Buenos Ayres, 244


R

Railroad from New Gulf to Chubut, 179, 180, 269

Rails, song and dance of the long-legged, 211

Ranch, on Beagle Channel, 117;
  dinner at, at Santa Cruz, 223

Ranchman, marriage of, to Tehuelche girl, 224;
  divorce, 224;
  income of, 226;
  restraints of civilization unbearable to, after wild life of
      the deserts, 226

Rawson, capital, 172, 177

Records of missionary life and training at Keppel, 87 _et seq._

Religion of Yahgans, 70 _et seq._

Reynard, Mr. H. L., introduces sheep raising into Punta Arenas, 31

Rio Gallegos (_see_ Gallegos).

Rio Grande do Sul, in Brazil, 228

Rio Negro, Spanish colony (_see_ Carmen de Patagones).

Rio Santa Cruz (_see_ Santa Cruz).

Roca's expeditions against Tehuelches, 156, 276

Roedorn, Count Richard of, passenger on _Ushuaia_, 267

Rufous (_see_ Prairie chicken).

Rugs of otter, seal, and swan's down, 296

Rum cheap in the Argentine, 244


S

Sagebrush and swamps found at San Sebastian Bay, 11

St. George, Gulf of, 293

St. John Bay, 15;
  Harbor, 138;
  Cape of, 139;
  description of tide rip at entrance of, 142;
  Government post established in 1884, 143;
  Government post of Staten Island to support lighthouse, 143;
  governor's residence, 144 _et seq._;
  description of lighthouse, 146;
  story of runaway sailor boy, 146-148

St. Julian harbor, 151

St. Lawrence Bay, 67

Salt fields on Rio Negro, 152, 157

Sandy Point (_see_ Punta Arenas)

San Sebastian Bay, placer gold found at, 10;
  gold seekers attacked by Indians, 11;
  no running water near gold layers, 11;
  gold found by Popper, 120;
  break in Andes at, 125

Santa Cruz, guanaco cemetery at, 186;
  Gallegos, capital of territory of, 215;
  amount of profitable land in, 217;
  amount of worthless land in, 217;
  price of sheep in, 218;
  800,000 sheep in, 287;
  future prosperity of, 287;
  fine sheep ranch near city of, 222;
  description of house on sheep ranch near, 223;
  passengers to, 262;
  _Ushuaia_ arrives at, 276;
  Weddell's Bluff, 276;
  presidio, or barracks, 276;
  to be used as base of operations in case of trouble with Chili, 276;
  profitable sheep raising in, 276;
  town consisted of nine buildings, 277;
  deserted missionary church in, 277;
  plan of prospective city, 278;
  price of land at, 278;
  enormous shipments of wool from, 278;
  good pasture land in, 278;
  traces of gold at Lake Argentine, 278;
  enterprising land "boomer" of, 279;
  natural advantages of, 279;
  probable gold mines in Andes, 279;
  fine timber land near, 279 _et seq._;
  lack of good drinking water, 281;
  method of drawing water from wells with horse and lasso, 281

Santa Cruz River, 32;
  explored by Darwin, 169;
  impassable barrier to armadilloes, 199;
  tramp at, 253;
  navigable throughout its course, 279;
  owners of water front control all the range back, 280;
  Gov. Mayer large land owner on, 280;
  tide rises over forty feet at mouth of, 281

Santa Maria River, gold found at, 10

Sarmiento, reference to, 3;
  starving colony, 34, 80;
  Pedro, 169

Sarmiento Mount, 25;
  snow capped peaks of, 41;
  peak of coast range on Tierra del Fuego, 47

Saunders, James, 215;
  sheep raiser in Patagonia, 280

Scenery, of Punta Arenas like Adirondacks, 34, 41;
  along Patagonia coast, 297, 299

Sea fowl, methods of gathering eggs of, 68

Sea mosses above tree line on mountains of Fuegian islands, 51

Seals, fur and hair, in Cape Horn region, 75

Seaweed, uses of, 68;
  varieties of, 295

Serpents easily destroyed by panther, 196

Sheep, long-wooled variety in favor, 219;
  diseases of, 220;
  800,000 in Santa Cruz territory, 287.

Sheep raising, a productive industry in Patagonia, 215;
  profits for one year, 216;
  success in, at Gallegos, 216;
  profitable to the individual, 217;
  amount of capital needed for, 218,
  expenses of, 218, 220;
  care of lambs, 219;
  profits of, in Punta Arenas, 219;
  average pounds of wool per sheep, 220;
  as compared with Argentine and United States, 220;
  havoc made by foxes and wild-cats, 220;
  conservative estimate of profits of, 221;
  compared with cattle business in the United States, 221;
  wool sold for gold, 222;
  ranchmen paid in paper, 222

Sheep ranch, established on Keppel Island, 85;
  description of, at Santa Cruz, 222

Shells, curious, 295;
  antediluvian oyster, 295;
  mussel, 295

Shellfish, 59, 76, 83, 295

Skees, Norwegian, 149

Skunks, made pets by Indians, 198;
  eaten by Indians, 198

Skyring Water near Punta Arenas, 282

Slings, Yahgans expert in use of, 59, 60

Sloggett Bay, rich in nugget gold, 18;
  story of one expedition to, 19;
  peculiar difficulties of mining in, 20 _et seq._

Sloop of prospectors, 24

Snakes of desert destroyed by deer, 198

Snow, Captain W. Parker, commander of mission ship, 85;
  establishes mission on Keppel Island, 85

Snow storms every month in Cape Horn region, 91

"Son of the southwest gale," gaucho term for dragon fly, 246

Spaniard Harbour, or Aguirre Bay, 84

Spanish-American nations, lack of enterprise among, 279;
  Argentine an exception, 279;
  "adobe money" of, 279

Sparrow, desert, 232;
  description of, 232

Spears used by Yahgans, 58;
  by Tehuelches, 164

Spider of the hot pampas attacks man, 246

Springs one hundred miles apart in Patagonian desert, 157

Squash the favorite vegetable of Argentine ranchmen, 271

Squirrel, prairie, food of Onas, 129

Staten Island of Cape Horn, 15, 137;
  similarity of ridges of, to Rocky Mountains, 139;
  end of backbone of Western Hemisphere, 139;
  _Ushuaia_ bound for Antarctic, 138;
  view of, 139, 140;
  mountain ridge 2,000 to 3,000 feet high, 140;
  vegetation of mountains, 140;
  varied and interesting forms of bird-life off, 141;
  terrific seas and tide rips in, 142;
  Government post at St. John Harbor, 142;
  St. John Bay, 143;
  lighthouse of St. John's Cape, 143-146;
  story of runaway sailor boy, 146 _et seq._;
  peculiar formation of the island, 148;
  bays of, filling with sand, 148;
  interior of, almost impassable, 149;
  supply of wood, 150;
  climate, 150;
  gold on New Year's Island, 150

Steubenrach, Mr., British Consular agent, 126;
  introduces sheep raising on Fuegian prairies, 126;
  places missionary in charge of ranch, 126

Stirling, Rev. W. H., missionary to Keppel, 87;
  Bishop of South America, takes up residence on mainland, 89;
  ordained Bishop of Falkland Islands, 90;
  safe journey through Ona country, 133

Story-tellers, skilful, among Yahgan tribe, 65

Straits of Magellan (_see_ Magellan).

Straits of Le Maire (_see_ Le Maire).

Swans, myriads of in Cape Horn region, 75;
  black and white, 207;
  good eating, 208;
  favorite breeding places, 208


T

Tan bark in Punta Arenas, 43

Tea, Paraguay (_see Maté_).

Tehuelches, half-breed squaw in tailor-made gown, 44;
  Indian tribe of Patagonia, 128;
  same origin as Onas, 129;
  have no boats, 129;
  consider horse meat a delicacy, 129;
  liquid language of, 132;
  make tents of skins, 130, 165;
  are nomads, 151;
  a noble race, 151;
  visited by Magellan, 151;
  exact tribute from Spanish colony, 152 _et seq._;
  obtain horses, 152;
  character of, 152;
  chief demanding tribute in Carmen de Patagones, 153;
  story of efforts to convert, 153 _et seq._;
  receive missionaries kindly, 154;
  maintain independence for 360 years, 155;
  war of extermination against, 155;
  prisoners tortured by whites, 156;
  home region of, 156;
  alluvial soil, 157;
  salt lakes and beds, 157;
  volcanic rocks, 157;
  physical proportions of, 157 _et seq._;
  prodigious strength, 158;
  personal appearance, 158;
  attractive women, 158;
  habit of gum chewing, 159;
  population before and after war of extermination, 159;
  mental qualities of, 159;
  literature of, 159;
  fables of, 159 _et seq._;
  religious beliefs of, 160 _et seq._;
  religious rites of, 161;
  medicine men and women, 161;
  superstitions of, 161 _et seq._;
  musical instruments of, 162;
  division of time, 162;
  astronomy of, 162;
  government, 162;
  ceremonies of marriage and divorce, 163;
  happy home life of, 163;
  cider festivals 164;
  love of liquor chief vice, 164;
  apple orchards of, 164;
  weapons of, 164;
  use of guns and pistols, 164;
  methods of hunting game, 164 _et seq._;
  modesty of, 165;
  morality of, 165;
  corrupted by whites, 165 _et seq._;
  methods of cooking, 166;
  habits of cleanliness among, 166;
  food of, 166, 167;
  characteristics of, 167;
  meaning of name, 173;
  help Welsh colonists, 173;
  chief's dying remark, 175;
  blankets made by squaws, 234 _et seq._;
  beguiled sailors to desert, 257 _et seq._;
  made slaves of them, 258;
  story of baby found by Lieut. Wilson, 273;
  glass arrow-heads made by, 296

Tekenika Bay, 104

_Teresina B._, story of dismantled sloop named, 134 _et seq._

Thetis Bay, Argentine military station, 127

Tierra del Fuego (_see_ under Fuego).

Tinamon, spotted (_see_ Prairie chicken).

Tower Rock (_see_ Port Desire).

Tramps, of Patagonia, 250;
  first view of, at Madryn, 251;
  story of mysterious, at Madryn, 251 _et seq._;
  from Sandy Point, 253 _et seq._;
  causes of development of, 254, 256;
  ordinance against, at Gallegos, 255;
  in Chubut, 256;
  sailors beguiled by Indians to desert, 257;
  hardships of, among Indians, 258;
  number of, compared with those in the United States, 259

Transport, trip on Argentine (_see Ushuaia_).

Tropical luxuriance of growth in Tierra del Fuego, 23

Turner, L. M., on Eskimo language, 63

Turnips, size of, at Tierra del Fuego, 115;
  grown at Punta Arenas, 289


U

Uruguay, quarantine station of, 228 (_see_ Flores Island).

Useless Bay, on Tierra del Fuego, 10, 125

Ushuaia, capital of Argentine Tierra del Fuego, 15, 79, 261;
  mining camp, 24;
  coldest spot of the region, 52;
  location of, on Tierra del Fuego, 79;
  first missionary station at, 89;
  near Chili line, 101;
  military post established at, 102;
  a remarkable capital, 107;
  sub-prefectura, 108;
  good harbor, 109;
  first view of, 109;
  description of the capital, 110;
  latitude of, 111;
  lack of sunshine in, 111;
  inhabitants of, 112;
  life in, 113 _et seq._;
  size of vegetables in, 115;
  good pasturage in, 115;
  Figue, storekeeper at, 115, 297;
  work done by Yahgans, 116;
  severe climate, 116;
  life dull in, 117;
  curios to be found at, 295 _et seq._;
  gold dust obtained at, 297

_Ushuaia_, Argentine naval transport, voyage on, 9;
  in dangerous waters, 15;
  arrives at Punta Arenas, 33;
  voyage continued, 117;
  bound for Antarctic Staten Island, able sea boat, 139, 264;
  view of Staten Island from, 140;
  anchors in St. John Bay, 143;
  sails from Buenos Ayres, 261;
  description of, 261 _et seq._;
  life on board, 261-268;
  first meal on board, 262;
  dish-washing on board, 262;
  captain of, 263;
  amusing discomforts on board, 265 _et seq._;
  "Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay" in four languages, 267;
  encounters head winds and seas, 268;
  arrives at New Gulf, 268;
  a slow tub, 268;
  card playing on board of, 268;
  betting, 268;
  arrives at Port Desire, 270;
  arrives at Santa Cruz, 276;
  arrives at Gallegos, 281;
  captain a fine sportsman, 288;
  ducks thick off Santa Cruz, 288;
  table not beyond criticism, 288;
  variety of fish and game courses, 288;
  lack of fresh vegetables, 289;
  serious discomforts on board of, 288-291;
  a novel mixed drink, 292;
  returns to Buenos Ayres, 299

Ushuaia Bay, description of, 90


V

Valley of the Missionaries, near Santa Cruz, 277

Vegetable food native to Cape Horn region, 49, 75, 115, 157, 178, 238, 289

Vendettas among Yahgan tribe, 67 _et seq._

Vincent, Mr. Frank, remarks upon Punta Arenas, 46

Virgin, Cape, wreck of Argentine sailors on, 4;
  wreck of S. S. _Arctic_ on, 6, 10;
  gold supply renewed after storms at, 13, 283

_Viscacha Lagostomus Trichodactylus_ (_see_ Prairie dog).

Vocabulary of Yahgans, 63

Volcanic bluffs at Port Desire, 157;
  volcanic peaks, range of, south of Rio Gallegos, 157


W

Wallis, Capt. Samuel, early navigator, 43, 260

Weasels, malignant faces of, 197;
  larger than United States variety, 197;
  travel in packs, 197

Weddell's Bluff (_see_ Santa Cruz).

Wells, Ensign Roger, U. S. N., 62;
  prepared Eskimo-English vocabulary, 63

Welsh settlement at Chubut, 33, 168;
  cause of founding colony, 168 _et seq._;
  pilgrims, landing of, 169;
  obtains grant of land in Patagonia, 169;
  great sufferings of, 171;
  alkali water, 171;
  gypsum, 171;
  lay out capital city, named Rawson, 172;
  make friends with Tehuelches, 173;
  foes of the desert, 173;
  provisions supplied by Argentine Government, 173;
  hardships of, 173 _et seq._;
  succeeds at last, 175 _et seq._;
  wheat and barley crops, 176;
  denominational churches of, 177;
  no physicians in, 178;
  prospectors for gold, 178;
  lignite and quartz workings, 178;
  import sheep, 178;
  profit in sheep raising, 179;
  colony sixty miles long, 252

Whaits, Mr. R., mission carpenter, 88

Whale Sound, 15

Whales abounded in Cape Horn waters, 75

Wheelright, Mr. William, founder of Pacific Steam Navigation Co., 29

"Wild mirth of the desert," gaucho term for ostrich hunting, 246

Williams, Mr. Richard, catechist and surgeon, 82

Willis, Captain, of mission schooner, 123

"Williwaws," whirling squalls, 299

Wilson, Don Juan, sub-prefect of Port Desire, 272;
  story of, 272 _et seq._;
  story of his servant, 273

Winds, high, in Tierra del Fuego, 15, 23, 51, 138, 235, 298

Wollaston Island, gold-bearing banks on, 7, 48, 87


Y

Yahgans, or Antarctic Highlanders, Indian tribe described by
Darwin, 48 _et seq._;
  compared with Eskimos, 49;
  without clothing or shelter, 49;
  description of, 50;
  homes of, 52;
  dress of, 53;
  habits of, 54;
  canoes of, 54;
  dimensions of canoes, 55;
  method of building canoes, 56;
  weapons of, 57;
  implements of, 57 _et seq._;
  methods of fishing and extracting oil, 59-61;
  utensils of, 61;
  language of, 62;
  vocabulary, 63;
  remarkable mental development, 63;
  origin of, 64;
  country of, explored, 64;
  language of, melodious, 64, 132;
  government of, 66;
  treatment of squaws, 64;
  native politeness of, 65;
  skilful story-tellers, 65;
  poets, novelists, and historians, 65;
  clever talkers, 66;
  abundance of food, 66, 75;
  songs and dances of, 66;
  abundant leisure, 66;
  lax notions about property, 67;
  vendettas of, 67 _et seq._;
  crimes of, 69;
  favorite modes of revenge, 68;
  marriages of, 69;
  religion of, 70;
  ideas of death, 71;
  treatment of the sick, 71;
  customs of mourning, 71;
  folk lore, 71;
  personal appearance of, 73 _et seq._;
  women of tribe, 74;
  ferocity towards whites, 75;
  methods of cooking, 76;
  traditions of, 76;
  not cannibals, 77;
  characteristics of, 77 _et seq._;
  civilization the ruin of, 77, 78;
  first missionary to, 81;
  missionaries' plan for civilizing, 91;
  become farm laborers, 92;
  report of Mr. Bridges, 93 _et seq._;
  work required by missionaries of, 95;
  scanty pay, 95, 98;
  change of dress and habits of, 101;
  epidemics among, 102 _et seq._;
  civilization an evil to, 104-106;
  physical deterioration and diminution of, 103-105;
  work done by, in Argentine capital, 116;
  work on Mr. Bridge's ranch, 119;
  described by early navigators, 52, 128;
  rush baskets of, 296;
  make models of their canoes and weapons for sale, 297


Z

Zanibelli, Luis, dealer in Indian relics, 44






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