Narrative of the surveying voyages of his majesty's ships Adventure and Beagle (vol.1): between the years 1826 and 1836 : describing their examination of the southern shores of South America, and the Beagles's circumnavigation of the globe

1829- DESECHO OSORIO SAN TADEO. 327 took to a branch of it that ran first to the eastward, and then to the northward." There they landed, took the canoes to pieces, and carried them over the isthmus ; then putting them toge- ther again, re-embarked, and proceeded through the Chonos Archipelago to Chiloe. When at Chiloe, I saw an old man, Pedro Osorio, who had been in two of the last missionary voyages (in 1769 and 1778), to the Guaineco Islands ; where the Wager was wrecked. He related to me the particulars of these voyages, and gave me an account of the ' Desecho,' over whicli the missionaries trans- ported their piraguas. He also remembered Byron and his companions ; and described them by the following names : Don David (Captain David Cheap) : Don Juan (John Byron) ; Hamerton (Hamilton) ; and Plasta. The name Plasta is not once mentioned in Byron's Narrative ; but on referring to Bulkeley's and Cumming's account, one Plastow is described as the captain's servant ; and perhaps he was one of the number who remained with Captain Cheap.(;?) Pedro Osorio must have been upwards of ninety years of age, in ]829.(o) A detailed account of these voyages is given in Aglieros's Historical Descrip- tion of the province of Chiloe, p. 205. Captain Stokes's ' Dead-tree Island,' in the entrance of San Estevan Gulf, is near the 'Cirujano Island ' (Surgeon Island) of those voyages. Pedro Osorio told me that it was so called, because the surgeon of the Wager died there. From Byron's Narrative it would appear, that tlie surgeon died, and was buried, just before they embarked to cross the sound. — See Byron, p. 147. As the examination of the River San Tadeo, and the dis- covery of the ' Desecho,' formed a part of Lieutenant Skyring's instructions, he proceeded up it, in a whale-boat, accompanied by Mr. Kirke, The entrance of the river is blocked up by a bar of sand and stones, which, at low spring-tide, must be nearly dry ; and a heavy swell breaks upon its whole length, joining the surf of the beach, on each side ; so that there is (zj Could ' Plasta' refer to Alexander Campbell ?— R. F, fa) Pedro Osorio died at San Carlos in 1832.— R. F.