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

398 SEIZE thieves' family. without risk of discovery, get near enough to ascertain : but, in case we should find them, we went armed, each with a pistol or gun, a cutlass, and a piece of rope to secure a prisoner. We landed at some distance from the cove, and, leaving two men with our boat, crept quietly through the bushes for a long distance round, until we were quite at the back of the new wig- wams ; then closing gradually in a circle, we reached almost to the spot undiscovered ; but their dogs winded us, and all at once ran towards us barking loudly. Further concealment was impossible, so we rushed on as fast as we could through the bushes. At first the Indians began to run away ; but hearing us shout on both sides, some tried to hide themselves, by squatting under the banks of a stream of water. The foremost of our party, Elsmore by name, in jumping across this stream, slipped, and fell in just where two men and a woman were con- cealed : they instantly attacked him, trying to hold him down and beat out his brains with stones ; and before any one could assist him, he had received several severe blows, and one eye was almost destroyed, by a dangerous stroke near the temple. Mr. Murray, seeing the man's danger, fired at one of the Fue- gians, who staggered back and let Elsmore escape ; but imme- diately recovering himself, picked up stones from the bed of the stream, or was supplied with them by those who stood close to him, and threw them from each hand with astonishing force and precision. His first stone struck the master with much force, broke a powder-horn hung round his neck, and nearly knocked him backwards : and two others were thrown so truly at the heads of those nearest him, that they barely saved themselves by dropping down. All this passed in a few seconds, so quick was he with each hand : but, poor fellow, it was his last struggle unfortunately he was mortally wounded, and, throwing one more stone, he fell against the bank and expired. After some struggling, and a few hard blows, those who tried to secrete themselves were taken, but several who ran away along the beach escaped : so strong and stout were the females, that I, for one, had no idea that it was a woman, whose arms I and my coxswain endeavoured to pinion, until I heard some