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

APPENDIX. 1S7 leading man of his tribe, •which authority was confirmed to him by the Spaniards ; for he carried the usual badge and mark of distinc- tion by which the Spaniards and their dependents hold their military and civil employments, which is a stick with a silver head." " This report of our shipwreck (as we supposed) having reached the Chonos by means of the intermediate tribes, v/hich handed it to one another, from those Indians who visited us ; this cacique was •either sent to learn the truth of the rumour, or, having first got the intelligence, set out with a view of making some advantage of the wreck," " Having understood my necessities, they (the two women) talked together some httle time ; after which, getting up, they both went out, taking with them a couple of dogs, which they train to assist them in fishing. After an hour's absence, they came in trembling with cold, and their hair streaming %Yith water, and brought two iish, which, having broiled, they gave me the largest share; and then we all laid down, as before, to rest." " After rovnng some time, they (the women) gained such an offing as they required, where the water was about eight or ten fathoms deep, and there lay upon their oars. And now the youngest of the two women, talking a basket in her mouth, jumped overboard, and diving to the bottom, continued imder water an amazing time when she had filled the basket with sea-eggs, she came up to the boat- side, and delivering it so filled to the other women in the boat, they took out the contents, and returned it to her. The diver then, after having taken a short time to breathe, went dovra and up again, with the same success ; and so several times for the space of half an hour. It seems as if Providence had endued this people with a kind of amphibious nature, as the sea is the only source from whence almost all their subsistence is derived. This element, too, being here very boisterous, and falling with a most hea\y surf upon a rugged coast, very little, except some seal, is to be got any where but in the quiet bosom of the deep. What occasions this reflection is, the early propensity I had so frequently observed in the children of these savages to this occupation, who, even at the age of three years, might be seen crawling upon their hands and linees among the rocks