Chapter XVII (2)

There is a marked difference of climate between the east and west sides of Chilóe, as to quantity of rain and wind. A proportion of both appears to be arrested (as it were) on the windward side of the heights, so that the neighbourhood of Castro and the islands in the Gulf of Ancud, enjoy much finer weather than is met with about San Carlos. But even there the inhabitants say a change has taken place gradually, and that they have not now nearly so much rain as used to fall formerly. They attribute this to the wood being cleared away, not only on Chilóe itself, but on the neighbouring Cordillera. There is an idea prevalent in Chilóe that, after a great eruption of Osorno in particular, or indeed of any of the neighbouring volcanoes, fine weather is sure to follow. Without denying the possibility of some such correspondence, I should incline to think that there have been accidental coincidences; and that fine weather occurring about or soon after those times, has been more remarked than at other periods.

On the little uninhabited island, Chiut, in the middle of Ancud Gulf, Mr. Sulivan found a great number of wild strawberries: they were not very good, being unripe. Near the islands beyond Chiut (called Desertas), on the shore of the mainland, he saw several piraguas stranded, evidently during a late gale, as their crews were engaged in repairing them on the beach.

In the island Alau, Lieut. Sulivan met an old native, about 112 years of age; who had great-grandchildren about him, from twelve to fourteen years old. His eyesight and intellectual faculties were still good, and he walked firmly. From the inhabitants of Alau, Mr. Sulivan heard that an English armed brig, accompanied by a Spanish vessel of war, had anchored at that island about seventy years before 1835 (1765). Our boats visited Calbuco, and happening to arrive during the time of Mass, found nobody stirring. At last one man came out of church--ran back instantly--as if to tell the news, and immediately hundreds came pouring out to see the strangers.

Calbuco, called also El Fuerte, is much superior to Castro in appearance as well as size. It ranks next to San Carlos, in consequence to the Chilotes. Near here it was that friendly Indians helping the distressed inhabitants of Osorno to escape from the Araucanians (1599-1605), raised a cry of Calbu-co (blue water), when, emerging from the woodland, they caught a glimpse of the sea.

Our party examined places on the east coast of Chilóe, where docks might be constructed, or vessels laid ashore with much facility, as the tide rises from fifteen to twenty-five feet in several land-locked coves where the swell of the ocean never penetrates.

Round Chilóe the flood tide-streams run both ways, from the south-west; and meet in the north-west part of Ancud Gulf; the times of syzygial high water, in all the archipelago, vary only from noon to an hour and half after noon. In December and January our boat expedition found that the night tides were always higher than those of the day, and the inhabitants said that was always the case in summer. In the months of July and August 1829 the day tides were higher than the night, I am quite certain; and an old Biscayan, resident near point Arena, told me that they were always so in winter: hence we may conclude they are regularly higher at that time of year.

I refrain from entering here into many very interesting customs of the Huilli-che, because they are almost the same as those of the Araucanian Indians, about whom so much has been sung or said by Ercilla, Molina, and others, because my pages are limited, there being still information of a newer character to be written; but I would ask the reader, who may feel interested about the migrations of our race, to compare such customs with those of the Polynesian islanders, especially that of the ‘Minga,’ and making ‘Cava.’[51]

The superstitious ideas, arising out of a debased Romish doctrine, have not deprived the Huilli-che of their belief in witchcraft, a belief held in common with all ignorant nations. Mr. Douglas, in his MS. Journal, says:--“No Chilote doubts the existence of wizards (bruxos). When I was a magistrate, a complaint was made to me of a young woman who, they asserted, had tried to bewitch a young man. The witnesses stated that she had bought from a professed witch (bruxa) a charm (llapui), which was produced in evidence. It consisted of a piece of loadstone, with iron filings adhering to it; some fish-scales; some hair and soap suds, proved to have been on the young man’s face, and sold by the barber; some parings of his nails; a small dead lizard; some slips of a peculiar tree; and many other ingredients. With this charm, with two prepared apples, and a bottle half full of a liquid mixed by the witch, she proposed to win the young man’s affections to such a degree that he would give her all his property. The liquid appeared to be a decoction of the deadly nightshade, and some poisonous ferns. The witnesses stated also, that this witch had a lantern made of the skin of a still-born child, which she lighted with a candle that burned with a blue flame; and gave out sparks, when the witch flew through the air from place to place.

“I have been informed,” continues Mr. Douglas, “upon indisputable authority, that such lanterns do exist; and that when two or more witches wish to communicate by signal, one of them ties a lantern to a long pole, and throws it up and down very quickly, making the sparks fly. The other then makes similar use of her lantern, at a considerable distance, and those who casually see the lights, think that a witch has flown from one place to the other. The magical art of the wizard is often exercised in a search for hidden treasure. There are some places where, in a dark night, inflammable gas, or phosphoric light, is seen, near the ground, not like a Will-o’-th’-wisp of Europe, but a clear steady light, of a white, yellow, or red colour. Popular superstition ascribes these lights to the ghosts of departed misers, watching their hidden treasure; and when one is discovered by any person, he calls a friend to assist him and watch it, about the time of new moon, until they ascertain the spot whence it proceeds; and there they dig in search of an anticipated heap of gold or silver. Not succeeding (of course), they apply to a wizard, who pretends to discover where the treasure lies, and what it is, by looking earnestly into a smooth slab of black stone (which I suppose to be basalt). The wizard may not himself find the prize, nor may he be present at the search; but, after telling the people where and when to dig, he takes good care to alarm and frighten them away in some strange manner, just at the moment they expect to grasp the store of gold. Among other devices, the wizard, or witch, pretends to cover a worsted thread with quicksilver, and holding it over the supposed place, allows the quicksilver to run off into the ground, and then he desires them to dig till they find the quicksilver, thus affording time for creating some sudden alarm, which they attribute to the ‘devoto,’ or familiar spirit of the deceased. It is believed by some that I am able to discover hidden treasure, and for my amusement I have more than once made an experiment before them, by sticking up two stakes in a line towards the light; then going a quarter of a circle round it, I stuck up two more stakes, also in a line towards it; and next day followed the lines to their crossing, at which spot I dug, and about two feet underground found a decayed tree.” (Whence a gaseous exhalation?)

Mr. Douglas’s account of the life of an industrious Calbucano[52] is interesting. He says, that those who are called ‘hombres de bien’ (honest men) are generally the sons of worthy parents, and who marry, while young, some hard-working sober woman. Such a pair, as one of these men and his wife, sow some corn and plant potatoes, then leave the land, with their house, in the care of an old relation, and go to the Cordillera to work in an astillero.[53] If their luck is good, that is, if they find plenty of fine, straight grained trees, not farther than usual from the sea,[54] this pair will cut and bring down five hundred boards in a month; then returning home they clean the potato grounds, and attend to domestic affairs, until their feet heal, and a paralytic motion of the legs, acquired in the astillero, has ceased. When quite refreshed they go for another cargo, and work till their legs and feet can stand it no longer. A third trip is afterwards made by the husband, for about a fortnight, to a nearer astillero, where he cuts pieces of timber and plank of as large a size as he can carry (tablones y cuartones), then returns to collect his harvest, make chicha, and sow corn for next year. The winter months are passed in comparative inactivity, but not without due consumption of cider and potatoes. Occasionally the Calbucano goes to San Carlos, to sell, or rather barter his boards for indigo, tobacco, red pepper, clothes, axes, spirits, &c.; and on these occasions, as well as when they go from Calbuco to the continent, several unite together to man a piragua, in the manner described by Captain King, vol. i, p. 285-6.

Directly his children are able to walk a few miles, he takes them with him to the astillero; begins by giving them two half-boards to carry, and as they grow stronger, increases their load. At about sixteen they borrow an axe, and make the boards they afterwards carry. The alerse forests are like mines to the Calbucano; and nothing but old age or accident can check him from making boards after he has had one season of good luck. The profitable parts of the forests are now, of course, much farther from the sea than they were, owing to constant thinning. To get a load of twenty boards twice as much labour is therefore required as was necessary for a similar purpose thirty years ago. The largest alerse tree that has been found by any Calbucano during the last forty years, measured thirty feet in girth, at five feet from the ground; and more than seventy-six feet to the first branches. This famous tree gave eight lengths of boards and half a length. The two largest trees seen by Mr. Douglas, in his excursion for me, measured one twenty-four, and the other twenty-two feet round, at five feet from the ground: but these were dead trees, hollow in the centre. He saw none above ten feet in circumference, that were quite sound. Report, however, says, that in the Cordillera, out of reach of the Calbuco woodsmen, there are enormous trees, from thirty to forty feet in girth, and from eighty to ninety feet in height to the first branches, above which the heads of those giant trees are said to rise some forty or fifty feet. The alerse has short, stout branches, with leaves like those of a pine, in their bluish green colour, but shorter, being only half an inch long, and one-twentieth of an inch wide: on one stem there are four rows of these small leaves, at opposite sides.

Captain King has fully described the alerse (vol. i, p. 282-3), and the manner of making the boards. I will add a few notices of the way in which it is obtained.

In carrying his load along many miles of bad road from an ‘astillero,’ to the nearest water conveyance, the Calbucano wears a sheep-skin on his shoulders, under a woollen shirt, and taking a stick, with its lower end forked,[55] he trudges along with the load on one shoulder, and on the other the stick, which partly supports the weight till one shoulder is tired; he then shifts the burthen to the other, and goes on. This half rest is called ‘cantuntun.’ After eight, ten, or twelve of these, according to his strength, and the road, he casts down the load, and rests about ten minutes. This is his ‘descanso;’ and he makes about one such every two or three miles. The astillero of Melipulli is ten ‘descansos,’ a whole day’s journey, from the place of embarkation. In examining the different forests of alerse, Mr. Douglas saw some immense land-slips (quechi), one of which was said to have brought down one thousand alerses, some of them being five fathoms round near the roots. This land-slip measured seven hundred yards in length and three hundred yards in width.

Mr. Douglas finds much fault with the manner in which the Chilotes associate for a voyage, or any joint undertaking. He says, “their voyages being planned like a commonwealth, it follows that their government on board must be republican, and the consequence is that every thing is decided by most votes and most noise.” He also complains of their extreme selfishness, and of their reluctance to do any thing, however trifling, for a neighbour, unless for a consideration; another evil consequence of democratic inclinations.

When Moraleda was about Chilóe he went across the cordillera to the lake Nahuelhuapi, in quest of information relative to the ‘Cesares;’ but he could hear nothing positive about any such city or people, from the Indians whom he met near that lake--well known to the Spaniards as a jesuit missionary station. Mr. Douglas’s father-in-law[56] once commanded a party sent from Chilóe to look for this reported city of ‘Cesares.’[57] He got over and beyond the Cordillera to an elevated plain, where he saw a very large number of Indian huts (toldos), placed so as to form regular streets. Near them were large droves of horses and cattle, and small patches of cultivated ground: but he had no time to make further remarks, for his party was discovered, vigorously attacked and driven back, with loss, to the sea. The old man said the climate and soil of that plain were better than those of Chilóe: and, as a proof of it, he found Indian corn with from five to nine large heads, though in Chilóe the same kind of plant only bears from one to three small heads.

A few of the remarks relative to Chilóe, contained in the preceding pages, arose out of an excursion made by me, in 1829, among the neighbouring islands: and many of the other notices mentioned by Captain King (vol. i.) or myself, and given in the narrative as they were received from our associates, were corroborated by what I then witnessed. The excursion alluded to was undertaken in consequence of two carpenters belonging to the Beagle being enticed to desert by a Roman Catholic priest named Forastes, who not only afforded them the means of travelling to Castro and Lemuy, but hid them on his own premises afterwards; and, when he heard that I was seeking for them among the islands, sent them across the gulf of Ancud, in a piragua, to remain in a cove near the Corcovado until the search should be over. One of these men was not worth taking trouble about; but the other was a man who had borne a high character, and had a wife and children in England depending upon him for support. I was satisfied that this man (Wells) had not deserted until overcome by extraordinary temptation and the evil advice of his companion, and determined to do my utmost to recover him. He had pay due for several years’ service, and his ‘servitude time’[58] was considerable.

I despatched Mr. Kirke overland to Castro for intelligence; and set out in a light whale-boat, with five men, all as eager as I was myself to rescue their shipmate from the deceitful allurements of Padre Forastes. As a carpenter, also, every one was well aware, that his recovery was of much consequence to our small vessel, in a place where we could not obtain a substitute.

While visiting various islands I was much struck by the good order and cheerful alertness of several schools of boys, and by the apparent respectability of their teachers: and I was informed that these schools were much fostered by General Aldunate and his worthy secretary, Forelius (a Swede).

Nothing could be more pleasing than the appearance of the islands; all highly cultivated, and thickly peopled by a quiet race of men, apparently industrious, certainly most obliging and hospitable.

At Lemuy I heard that the fugitives had just left Chelin and Quehuy, in a piragua belonging to one Antonio Vargas, and were gone to the Cordillera, somewhere near the Corcovado, to kill seals and collect oil for him and Padre Forastes, until we should leave Chilóe, when they would return and work for the priest. This information cost me an ounce of gold, given to Vargas’s own brother: and for six dollars, in advance, with a promise of more, I engaged a guide (vaqueano) to go with me to the main land. This man had no idea of moving by night; but, understanding clearly that the piragua was gone to an inlet under the Corcovado Mountain, I sailed at once across the gulf, steering by the light of the volcano, much to the terror of our vaqueano, who shrunk down to the bottom of the boat, drew his poncho over his head, and kept muttering prayers, sometimes to the Virgin and his ‘devoto’ (patron saint), sometimes to ‘bruxos;’ but never ventured to look up at the large sail, or watch the boat reeling through the waves, as she sailed across with a fresh westerly wind.

After a variety of petty difficulties and disappointments, and searching every inlet within twenty miles of the Corcovado, without finding a trace of the fugitives, I at last abandoned the pursuit and returned to San Carlos; having relanded our unhappy vaqueano, who, while close to the land, had been useful; but whom we had ruined, he often asserted, by obliging him to promise away all his property in masses, in offerings to saints, and in presents to ‘bruxos’ for his safe deliverance from such continual peril. After hearing such a melancholy statement of his prospects, I added a present to his earnings, which he assured me would amply satisfy both ‘bruxos’ and ‘devotos,’ and left him, notwithstanding his temporary fears, a happy man.

In 1834 I learned that we had actually been within a boat’s length of the deserters on one occasion, and that they had made up their minds to yield unconditionally. They were hidden in some thick bushes on the borders of an inlet[59] under the Corcovado, and their piragua was hauled up behind a rock, out of immediate observation.

It is now high time to quit Chilóe, and proceed along the coast northward: but before I do so, let me take advantage of this opportunity to express the gratitude of those with me, as well as of myself, for a succession of private assistance and sincere kindness experienced from many persons at San Carlos, whose names I refrain from mentioning, because I have a great dislike even to the idea of publishing any thing that occurs in the unreserved intercourse of friends.

* * * * *

Extraordinary meteoric appearances have occasionally been noticed
about Chilóe, and the islands southward of it. In describing
the Carel-mapu earthquake, of 1633, Agüeros says that torrents
of rain followed; and that on a high hill near the town was
seen a globe of fire, which rose for a short interval, and then
fell into the sea: the waters of which were in consequence much
disturbed. A violent tempest ensued, with hail larger than
musket-balls.

Another remarkable earthquake happened thereabouts on the
23d-24th of December, 1737: and on the 30th, in the early part
of the evening, a great exhalation or cloud of fire was seen
passing, from north to south, over all the archipelago. It fell
on the Huayteca islands, covered them with ashes, and burned up
the vegetation to such a degree that it was only in 1750, that
the islands began again to look green.--Agüeros, pp. 102, 104,
105.

In Sarmiento’s voyage an appearance of a similar nature is
mentioned, as having been seen near the Strait of Magalhaens:
(Viage al Estrecho de Magallanes, p. 205).--Other authorities
might be quoted.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The Adventure had four chronometers.

[2] Not far from Cape Noir, on Noir Island.

[3] Though her sale was very ill-managed, partly owing to my being dispirited and careless, she brought 7,500 dollars, nearly £1,400, and is now (1838) trading on that coast, in sound condition.

[4] A Welshman, two Chilotes, a Chilian, and two Sandwich Islanders who had been left at San Carlos by a whaler.

[5] The Chilian.

[6] The Chilotes and Sandwich Islanders. Taffy remained faithful: he and Low, being able-bodied active men, frightened the rest into reluctant submission.

[7] Orders in Appendix, No. 21.

[8] About three or four hundred feet in height, excepting one hill, which is seven hundred feet.

[9] MS. Diary of Moraleda’s examination of Chilóe and part of the Chonos Islands in 1787-93, given to me at Lima, by a friend to whom I am much indebted for valuable information.

[10] “Neither the chart in Ulloa, nor any of the Spanish charts lately in use, show the name of N.S. del Socorro to any island near the coast hereabouts. The Spanish Atlas of 1798, places an island very near the coast, in 44° 50′ S. latitude, which in shape and situation answers nearly to Narborough’s description of the island, to which he gave his own name.”--(Burney, vol. iii. p. 360. Note.)

[11] “I saw no kind of mineral in it. Not finding this island noted in any draught (chart), I called it after my own name, Narbrough Island, and took possession of it for his Majesty and his heirs.”--(Narborough’s Voyage to Patagonia and Chile, in 1669-1671.)

[12] Called by Narborough “No-man’s Island.”

[13] Or between two rocks, so that the first sudden strain snapped the shank.

[14] Now in my possession.

[15] His Huamblin and Ipun I take to be Socorro and Narborough Islands, but am not certain.

[16] Having very little occupation on board, in his own particular line, just at that time, Mr. May volunteered to take an oar, as one of the boat’s crew.

[17] Orders in Appendix, No. 22.

[18] “Gran Canal de Ninualac, que atraviese el Archipiélago, por el informe del practico Hueñupal que casi anualmente la transita con el motivo expresado en el Diario.”--(Moraleda’s MS. Chart, 1795.)

[19] Huamblin, if, as I suppose it, a corruption of Huampelen, means ‘on watch,’ ‘posted as a sentinel:’ Ipun means ‘swept off,’ or ‘swept away:’ Lemu means ‘wood:’ names singularly applicable to each of those islands respectively.

[20] Pastene, a Genoese, was, I believe, in this expedition. His MS. Journal is said to exist in the archives of Barcelona.

[21] In this extract from Burney (Appendix No. 23), there is a criticism upon a hydrographical error, made by some copyist, which is interesting to me from its correspondence with what I suspect to have taken place in the old charts of Nassau Bay and Cape Horn.--(See pages 122, 123.)

[22] Cone Creek.

[23] Christmas Cove.

[24] With one exception. On a height near Cone Creek Mr. Darwin found, in a sheltered hollow of the rock, strewed with dry grass, what appeared to him the place on which a man had slept. For some time this puzzled us considerably: probably a sealer had slept there.

[25] Cape Taytao is a high bold promontory.

[26] Hellyer Rocks.

[27] Now called Anna Pink Bay.

[28] Patch Cove.

[29] Anson’s Voyage, chapter iii.

[30] Exclusive of mistakes made by compilers or translators.

[31] Appendix, No. 24.

[32] It is difficult to account for the present abandoned state of these regions, if no harsh usage was experienced by their former natives.

[33] Stokes, MS.

[34] The writer of Anson’s voyage, speaking of Juan Fernandez, exactly describes the loose state of trees in such places, when he says, “The northern part of this island is composed of high, craggy hills, many of them inaccessible, though generally covered with trees. The soil of this part is loose and shallow, so that very large trees on the hills soon perish for want of root, and are then easily overturned, which occasioned the death of one of our sailors; who being upon the hills, in search of goats, caught hold of a tree upon a declivity, to assist him in his ascent, and this giving way, he immediately rolled down the hill; and though in his fall he fastened on another tree of considerable bulk, yet that, too, gave way, and he fell among the rocks, and was dashed to pieces. Mr. Brett likewise met with an accident, only by resting his back against a tree, near as large about as himself, which stood on a slope; for the tree giving way, he fell to a considerable distance, though without receiving any injury.”--(Anson’s Voyage, 8vo. edit., p. 159.)

[35] Cucuy is the name of a bird, much noticed by the aborigines because its motions are supposed to be ominous: it also means grandmother.

[36] The Huyhuen-che, often called Huyhuenes, were a tribe of Chonos Indians, adjoining the Pichi-huilli-che, who lived in the northern portion of Chilóe. The word Huyhuen signifies ‘whistle,’ or ‘hiss,’ or ‘to whistle, or hiss.’

[37] Mr. Sulivan had the lance in his hand at that time.

[38] The volcano of Osorno, or Purraraque, or Hueñauca, is 7,550 feet above the sea level.

[39] The smaller islands of the Archipelago of Chilóe, those in the gulf between Chilóe and the mainland, called the Gulf of Ancoed or Ancud.

[40] These piraguas are extremely like the Madras surf-boats. (See vol. i. p. 285, for a description of the piragua.)

[41] First fruits of everything, animal as well as vegetable.

[42] They are implicit believers in witchcraft.

[43] Obtained for me by Mr. Robert Williams from the neighbourhood of San Carlos.

[44] Described in vol. i. p. 274-5.

[45]
“Aquí llegó, donde otro no ha llegado,
Don Alonso de Ercilla, que el primero
En un pequeño barco deslastrado
Con solos diez, pasó el desaguadero
El año de cincuenta y ocho entrado
Sobre mil y quinientos por Hebrero,
A las dos de la tarde el postrer dia,
Volviendo á la dexada compañia.”
LA ARAUCANA, Canto xxxvi.

[46] These were Huyhuenes, or Chonos, whose place was afterwards supplied by Huilli-che from southern Chile.

[47] Voyage of Five Ships of Rotterdam, Burney, vol. ii. p. 193. (supposing 46° should be 42° S.)

[48] I mention this to show that the accent, or stress, was then upon the second syllable of that name, not upon the third. The name Chilóe is derived from Chilue, or, more strictly speaking, from Chili-hue (see Agüeros and Molina), which means ‘farther,’ or ‘new,’ or ‘the end of’ Chili, and ought, by derivation, to have the accent, as Agüeros placed it, on the o. No reason can be given by a Spaniard for placing an accent on the final e of that word, yet it is almost generally placed there. My own idea is that the French traders to Chile in 1700-1780, first placed an accent on the e in writing, and that Feuillée, Frezier, and others have been followed without inquiry. Had not the stress been laid on the o, surely the natives of Chilóe would have been called Chiloetes, or Chiloenos, instead of Chilotes. As to the name Chile, every one knows it is derived from the Indian word Chili, (Herrera, Ovalle, Agüeros, Molina, &c.) but why it was altered by the Spaniards to Chile, I have never been able to discover.

[49] The number stated to me was 35,000.

[50] Every able-bodied native man is enrolled in the local militia, and obliged to work thus till disabled by infirmity.

[51] The Minga is described in Molina, and Spanish authors. For an excellent discussion respecting the Cava, see Burney--Brouwer’s Voyage, 1643, vol. iii. p. 137, 8, 9.

[52] Native of Calbuco.

[53] A timber-yard: or a place where alerse is cut down, on the flanks of the Cordillera of the Andes.

[54] From three to five miles.

[55] To steady him across bridges of single trees, thrown over ravines, as well as to assist in supporting the load. Sometimes they climb up or down precipices with their loads, by a fallen tree, notched to receive the feet.

[56] A Spaniard of Castile.

[57] Don Pedro de Angelis, of Buenos Ayres, has collected and published a great number of documents relating to the ‘Cesares.’

[58] For the pension granted to seamen in the Royal Navy after twenty-one years’ servitude.

[59] Palbitad, or Almangrande.