Narrative of the surveying voyages of his majesty's ships Adventure and Beagle (vol.2- Appendix): between the years 1826 and 1836 : describing their examination of the southern shores of South America, and the Beagles's circumnavigation of the globe

104 APPENDIX. opportunity of measuring one of their footsteps, which was eighteen inches long : he also found their graves, and mentions their customs of burying near the shore.* In 1591, Anthony Knevet, who sailed with Sir Thomas Cavendish in his second voyage, relates that he saw, at Port Desire, men fifteen or sixteen spans high, and that he measured the bodies of two that had been recently buried, which were fourteen spans long.f In 1599, Sebald de Veert, who sailed with Admiral de Cordes, was attacked in the Strait of Magellan by savages whom he thought to be ten or eleven feet high. He adds, that they were of reddish colour, and had long hair.t In the same year, Oliver Van Noort, a Dutch admiral, had a ren- contre with this gigantic race, whom he represents to be of a high stature, and of a terrible aspect. 1614. — George SpHbergen, another Dutchman, in his passage through the same Strait, saw a man, of a gigantic stature, climb- ing a hni as if to take a view of the ship.§ 1615. — Le Maire and Schouten discovered some of the burying-places of the Patagonians beneath heaps of great stones, and found in them skeletons ten or eleven feet long.|| Mr. Falkner supposes that formerly there existed a race of Pata- gonians superior to these m size ; for skeletons are often found of far greater dimensions, particularly about the river Texeira. Per- haps he may have heard of the old tradition of the natives mentioned by Cieza,^ and repeated from liim by Garcilasso de la Vega,** of certain giants having come by sea, and landed near the cape of St. Helena, many ages before the arrival of the Europeans. 1618. — Gracias de Nodal, a Spanish commander, in the course of his voyage, was informed by John Moore, one of his crew, who landed between Cape St. Esprit and Cape St. Arenas, on the south side of the Straits, that he trafficked with a race of men taller, by the head, than the Europeans. This and the next are the only instances I ever met with of the tall race being found on that side of the Strait. * Purclias, i. 58. t Purclias, i. 1232. J Col. Voy. by the Dutch East-India Company, &c. London, 1703, p. 319. § Purchas, i, 80. || Purchas, i. 91. t SeventPen years travels of Peter de Cieza, 138. *» Translated by Ricaut, p. 263.