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from Cape Blanco, to trace the coast, and look out for shoals
in the offing; in doing which, they found numerous ‘ salinas’
(extensive hollow places filled with salt), where the solid
mass of very white and good salt was several feet in thickness.
Guanacoes were numerous, hut shy. On the rocks some fur-
seal were seen; too few, however, to be worth a sealer’s notice.
The following week was passed in examining St. George Bay.
Scarcely any stream of tide was found in its western part,
though the rise amounted to nearly twenty feet. About-
Tilly road, where they landed, the mass or principal part of
the soil, where visible in cliffs or ravines, is loose sandy clay
(diluvium), with immense quantities of large fossil oyster shells
imbedded in it. These shells were found every where, even on
summits seven or eight hundred feet above the sea, and some
of them weighed eight pounds.
^ A place honoured by the Spaniards with the name of Malas-
pina, and described as a port, was found to be a wretched cove,
fuU of rocks, hardly safe even for the Liehre. While moored
there, our party witnessed lightning set fire to bushes and
grass. The flames spread rapidly, and for two days, the face
of the country continued to blaze. Near Port Arredondo, Mr.
Wickham went to the tops of several hills ; he found the country
unproductive, except of a few bushes, and yellow wiry
grass. There were no traces of natives. Very heavy rain fell
during the night of the 28th. I mention it thus particulaily,
because some persons have said that rain never falls on the east
coast of Patagonia, in any quantity.
The cove called ‘ Oven’ is a singular place, being a parting
(as It were) in the solid rock, nearly a mile in length, but very
narrow, with four fathoms water in it at low tide. Surrounded
on all sides hy precipitous hills, it is, indeed, an oven; and
would injure a ship seriously, even more than other ports
on this and coast, if she were to lie long in i t ; as her seams
would all be opened, and her planks split by the heat and
drought. The water found here was so strongly impregnated
with salt-petre, that it was not drinkable; but probably better
Leb. 1833. INDIAN TOMBS—POET SANTA ELENA. 305
might have been procured had they dug fresh wells. On the
lad been displaced, and some bones were lying about, a few
w ich were taken on board, but none could be got in a
strl!I Inland and thence to Cape Dos Bahias, the tide-
Bay n e lr c Í " httle creek, in Camarones
y, near Cape Dos Bahias, abundance of small wood, fit for
neks. A guanaco was shot, which weighed upwards of two
ones Bay but the country is sufficiently covered with o-rass of
good quality. Several Indian tombs w L seen on h í Mis
whence it may be inferred that natives at times frequlit the’
p a r partyt. UUnnf?o rt;u nately, not one of these tombs, s'i^m'‘phl yb yf roruer
^ular piles of stones, was found in an undisturbed state nei0
Huateduno7 t r “ " 7 ”®' discovered: they are all similarly
^_uated upon the most conspicuous, smooth, and round-topped
inucli 1 ke thopn-o-eo, „ expoied n tu .tio n ^ were o f re.pectfble
iiurnkti”, bruit I.ts f,"elslow was not seen.
After dusk on the 10th, while' endeavouring to enter New
Bay, with a fresh wind and strong flood-tide, the Liebre got
into a race, and was hustled within a fathom of i
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