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126 A I T E U D I X .
passage was too low for him to enter otherwise. After having proceeded
a considerable way thus, he arrived at a spacious chamber ;
but whether hollowed out by hands, or natural, he could not be
positive. The light into this chamber was conveyed through a hole
at the top; in the midst was a kind of bier, made of sticks laid
crossways, supported by props about five feet in height. Upon this
bier, five or six bodies were extended, which, in appearance, had been
deposited there a long time ; but had suffered no decay or diminution.
They were without covering, and the flesh of these bodies was
become perfectly dry and hard ; which, whether done by any art or
secret the savages may be possessed of, or occasioned by any drying
virtue in the air of the cave, could not be guessed. Indeed, the surgeon
finding nothing there to eat, which was the chief inducement
for his creeping into the hole, cUd not amuse himself with long disquisitions,
or make that accurate examination which he would have
done at another time; but, crawling out as he came in, he went and
told the first he met of what he had seen. Some had the curiosity
to go in likewise. I had forgot to mention that there was another
range of bodies, deposited in the same manner, upon another platform
under the bier. Probably this was the burial-place of their
great men, called caciques ; but from whence they could be brought,
we were utterly at a loss to conceive, there being no traces of any
Indian settlement hereabout. We had seen no savage since we left
the island, or observed any marks m the coves or bays to the northward,
where we had touched, such as fire-places, or old wigwams,
which they never fail of leaving behind them; and it is very probable,
from the violent seas .that are always beating upon this coast,
its deformed aspect, and the very swampy soil that every where
borders upon it, that it is little frequented,"
" A few days after our return, the mystery of the nailing up of
the hut, and what had been doing by the Indians upon the island in
our absence was partly explained to us ; for about the fifteenth day
after there came a party of Indians to the island in two canoes,
•tv-ho were not a little surprised to find us here again. Among these
was an Indian of the bibe of the Chonos, who live in the neighbourhood
of Chiloe. He talked the Spanish language, but with that
savage accent which renders it almost unintelhgible to any but those
who are adepts in that language. He was likewise a cacique, or
A P P E N D I X . 127
leading man of his tribe, which authority was confirmed to him by
the Spaniards ; for he earned the usual badge and mark of distinction
by which the Spaniards and their dependents hold their military
and civil employments, which is a stick with a silver head."
" Tills report of our shipwreck (as we supposed) having reached
the Chonos by means of the intermediate tribes, which 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 Uttle 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 with water, and brought two
fish, which, having broUed, they gave me the largest share; and
then we all laid down, as before, to rest."
" After rowing 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, taliing a basket in her mouth, jumped overboard,
and diving to the bottom, continued mrder water an amazing time ;
when she had filled the basket with sea-eggs, she came up to the boatside,
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 down 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 wuth a most heavy 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 knees among the rocks