hostile tribe nearest to his own. He often told us how the savage Oens
men "when the leaf red," crossed the mountains from the eastern coast
of Tierra del Fuego, and made inroads on the natives of this part of
the country. It was most curious to watch him when thus talking, and
see his eyes gleaming and his whole face assume a new and wild
expression. As we proceeded along the Beagle Channel, the scenery
assumed a peculiar and very magnificent character; but the effect was
much lessened from the lowness of the point of view in a boat, and from
looking along the valley, and thus losing all the beauty of a
succession of ridges. The mountains were here about three thousand
feet high, and terminated in sharp and jagged points. They rose in one
unbroken sweep from the water's edge, and were covered to the height of
fourteen or fifteen hundred feet by the dusky-coloured forest. It was
most curious to observe, as far as the eye could range, how level and
truly horizontal the line on the mountain side was, at which trees
ceased to grow: it precisely resembled the high-water mark of
drift-weed on a sea-beach.
At night we slept close to the junction of Ponsonby Sound with the
Beagle Channel. A small family of Fuegians, who were living in the
cove, were quiet and inoffensive, and soon joined our party round a
blazing fire. We were well clothed, and though sitting close to the
fire were far from too warm; yet these naked savages, though further
off, were observed, to our great surprise, to be streaming with
perspiration at undergoing such a roasting. They seemed, however, very
well pleased, and all joined in the chorus of the seamen's songs: but
the manner in which they were invariably a little behindhand was quite
ludicrous.
During the night the news had spread, and early in the morning (23rd) a
fresh party arrived, belonging to the Tekenika, or Jemmy's tribe.
Several of them had run so fast that their noses were bleeding, and
their mouths frothed from the rapidity with which they talked; and with
their naked bodies all bedaubed with black, white, [1] and red, they
looked like so many demoniacs who had been fighting. We then proceeded
(accompanied by twelve canoes, each holding four or five people) down
Ponsonby Sound to the spot where poor Jemmy expected to find his mother
and relatives. He had already heard that his father was dead; but as
he had had a "dream in his head" to that effect, he did not seem to
care much about it, and repeatedly comforted himself with the very
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