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

430 NATIVES GUANACOES OEANGE BAY. April 1830. as the western wigwams : but all were not so large. Every canoe gave chase to our boat, eager to see the strangers, and exchange small fish, spear-heads, or arrows, for buttons, beads, and other trifles. No arms or offensive weapons were seen among them, excepting fish spears, bows, arrows, and slings they had not even clubs, nor such lances as are used by the western tribes. They seemed to be more tractable, and less disposed to quarrel than those of the west. Wherever the boat went, she was followed by a train of canoes, each full of people, and having a fire smoking in the middle. Where they got the guanaco skins was a question not easy to answer. Was there a passage to the northward, by which they could trade with the people living there .'' — or were there guanacoes in the southern part of Tierra del Fuego ? Both the bones and skins seemed abundant ; but the people made signs to Mr. Murray that they came from the eastward : — none pointed towards the north. One native showed how they ran, and their shape, and how they were killed, also the kind of noise they made. " 15tli. Mr. Stokes returned, after going a long way to the north and west, without finding a passage into New Year Sound. His examination, united to Mr. Murray's, almost com- pleted the north and west part of Nassau Bay ; and only the east side remained to be explored. Our anchorage, called Orange Bay, is excellent ; and one of the few on this coast which are fit for a squadron of line-of-battle ships. Its ap- proach from the sea is as easy as the harbour is commodious. There are three fathoms close to the shore ; yet in no part are there more than twenty ; and every where there is a sandy bottom. Water is abundant ; Avood grows close to the sea ; wild-fowl are numerous ; and although shell-fish are scarce, plenty of small fish may be caught with hook and line among the kelp, and in the summer a seine will furnish abundance. " On the 16th we left Orange Bay, but light winds pre- vented our reaching the open sea that day, or during the following night. I was equally disposed to run out again to the Diego Ramirez — to look at the coast west of False Cape for about ten miles — or to run for the Bay of St. Francis ; but the