■ »774-
D ecember the day broke. At fix in themorning we palled Cape Horn,
which is a large black rock, at the extremity of an ifland,
lying before the NafTau inlet, difeovered by Jacques l ’Her-
mite *. This famous cape has hitherto been ill placed in
the charts, but the two voyages of captain Cook round it,
have fixed its fituation exactly at 5 50 5 8 'S: and 670
After taking our leave of the South Sea, we fleered for Le
Maire’s Strait, between Tierra del Fuego, and Staten Ifland.
Towards evening, we came near enough to obferve, that
this fide of Tierra del Fuego had a much milder afpeift,
than that about Chriftmas Sound. Here the land Hoped
down from the hills into long level points, covered with
tall forefts ; and no fnow was to be feen, except on the
diftant weftern mountains. We entered the ftrait the next
morning, but were becalmed in it almofl the whole day.
Succefs Bay lay open to our eyes, and the country about it
looked fo rich and fertile, that we heartily wifhed to make
fome flay there.
About two o’clock in the afternoon, whillt we were at
dinner, captain Cook difpatched a boat to the fhore, in order
to examine whether the Adventure had touched there, and
to leave fome account of our palling the ftrait. The Ihip
in the mean while flood on with faint breezes towards the
* See Recueil des Voyages qui ont fervi a I’Eftabliffement, &c. vol. IV, p,
696.
fide
fide of Tierra del Fuego, in order to take up the boat on its
return. A number of large whales,, not lefs than thirty,
and fome hundreds of feals, played in the water about ust
The whales went chiefly in couples, from whence we fup-
pofed this to be the feafon when the fexes-meet. Whenever
they fpouted up the water, or, as- the failors term it, were
feen blowing to windward, the whole fhip was infested
with a moft deteftable, rank, and poifonous flench, which
went off in the fpace of two or three-minutes; Sometimes
thefe huge animals lay on their backs, and with their long
pe&Oral fins beat the furface of the lea, which always
caufed a great noife, equal to the explofion of a fwivel:.
This kind of play has dbubtlefs given rife to the mariner’s
fiory of a fight between the thrafher and whale, of which
the former is faid to leap out of the water, in order to fall
heavily on the latter. Here we had an opportunity of ob-
ferving the fame exercife many times repeated, and difeerned
that all the belly and under fide of the fins and tail are of a >
white colour, whereas the reft is black. As we happened
to be only fixty yards from one of thefe animals, we perceived
a number of longitudinal furrows, or wrinkles, on
its belly, from whence we concluded it was the fpecies by
Linnseus named bahzna boops. Befides flapping their fins in the
water, thefe unwieldy animals, of forty feet in length, and
not lefs than ten feet in diameter, fometimes fairly leaped,
into the air, and dropped down again with a heavy fail,
which.
I774--
Decembea,