THE FUEGIANS.
Their miserable Condition.--Degradation of Body and Mind.--Powers
of Mimicry.--Notions of Barter.--Causes of their low State of
Cultivation.--Their Food.--Limpets.--_Cyttaria Darwini._--
Constant Migrations.--The Fuegian Wigwam.--Weapons.--Their
probable Origin.--Their Number, and various Tribes.--Constant
Feuds.--Cannibalism.--Language.--Adventures of Fuegia Basket,
Jemmy Button, and York Minster.--Missionary Labors.--Captain
Gardiner.--His lamentable End.
The wilds of Tierra del Fuego are inhabited by a race of men generally
supposed to occupy the lowest grade in the scale of humanity. In a far
more rigorous climate, the Esquimaux, their northern antipodes, exhibit
skill in their snow huts, their kayaks, their weapons, and their dress;
but the wretched Fuegians are ignorant of every useful art that could
better their condition, and contrive scarcely any defense against
either rain or wind.
But even among the Fuegians there are various grades of civilization--
or rather barbarism. The eastern tribes, which inhabit the extensive
plains of King Charles’s South Land, seem closely allied to the
Patagonians, and are a very different race from the undersized wretches
farther westward. A mantle of guanaco skin, with the wool outside--
the usual Patagonian garment--loosely thrown over their shoulders,
and leaving their persons as often exposed as covered, affords them
some protection against the piercing wind. The condition of the central
tribes inhabiting the south-western bays and inlets of this dreary
country is much more miserable. Those farther to the west possess
seal-skins, but here the men are satisfied with an otter skin or some
other covering scarcely larger than a pocket-handkerchief. It is
laced across the breast by strings, and according as the wind blows
it is shifted from side to side. But all have not even this wretched
garment, for near Wollaston Island Mr. Darwin saw a canoe with six
Fuegians, one of whom was a woman, naked. It was raining heavily,
and the fresh water, together with the spray, trickled down their
bodies. In another harbor not far distant, a woman, who was suckling a
recently-born child, came one day alongside the vessel, and remained
there out of mere curiosity, whilst the sleet fell and thawed on her
naked bosom and on the skin of her naked baby! These poor wretches were
stunted in their growth, their faces bedaubed with white paint, their
skins filthy, their hair entangled, their voices discordant, and their
gestures violent.
The Fuegians whom Cook met with in Christmas Sound were equally
wretched. Their canoes were made of the bark of trees stretched over
a framework of sticks, and the paddles which served to propel these
miserable boats were small, and of an equally miserable workmanship.
In each canoe sat from five to eight persons; but instead of greeting
the strangers with the joyful shouts of the South Sea Islanders, they
rowed along in perfect silence; and even when quite close to the
vessel, they only uttered from time to time the word “Pescheräh!” After
repeated invitations some of these savages came on board, but without
exhibiting the least sign of astonishment or curiosity. None were above
five feet four inches high; they had large heads, broad faces, with
prominent cheek-bones, flat noses, small and lack-lustre eyes; and
their black hair, smeared with fat, hung in matted locks over their
shoulders. Instead of a beard, their chin exhibited a few straggling
bristles, and their whole appearance afforded a striking picture of
abject misery. Their shoulders and breast were broad and strongly
built, but the extremities of the body so meagre and shrivelled that
one could hardly realize the fact that they belonged to the upper part.
The legs were crooked, the knees disproportionately thick. Their sole
garment consisted of a small piece of seal-skin, attached to the neck
by means of a cord, otherwise they were quite naked; but even these
miserable creatures had made an attempt to decorate their olive-brown
skin with some stripes of ochre. The women were as ugly as the men.
Their food consisted of raw, half-putrid seal’s flesh, which made them
smell so horribly, that it was impossible to remain long near them.
Their intelligence was on a par with the filth of their bodies. The
most expressive signs were here of no avail. Gestures which the most
dull-headed native of any South Sea island immediately understood,
these savages either did not, or would not give themselves the trouble
to comprehend. Of the superiority of the Europeans they appeared to
have no idea, never expressing by the slightest sign any astonishment
at the sight of the ship and the various objects on board. It would
however be doing the Fuegians injustice to suppose them all on a level
with these wretches. According to Forster, they were most likely
outcasts from the neighboring tribes.
Mr. Darwin, as well as Sir James Ross, describes the Fuegians whom they
met with in the Bay of Good Success and on Hermit Island as excellent
mimics. “As often as we coughed or yawned,” says the former, “or made
any odd motion, they immediately imitated us. Some of our party began
to squint and look awry, but one of the young Fuegians (whose whole
face was painted black, excepting a white band across his eyes)
succeeded in making far more hideous grimaces. They could repeat with
perfect correctness each word in any sentence we addressed them, and
they remembered such words for some time. Yet we all know how difficult
it is to distinguish apart the sounds in a foreign language.”
Close to the junction of Ponsonby Sound with the Beagle Channel, where
Mr. Darwin and his party spent the night, a small family of Fuegians
soon joined the strangers round a blazing fire. They seemed well
pleased, and all joined in the chorus of the seamen’s songs. During
the night the news had spread, and early in the morning other Fuegians
arrived. Several of these 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, and
red, they looked like so many demons.
[Illustration: 127. FUEGIAN TRADERS.]
These people plainly showed that they had a fair notion of barter. Mr.
Darwin gave one man a large nail (a most valuable present) without
making any signs for a return; but he immediately picked out two
fish, and handed them up on the point of his spear. Here at least we
see signs of a mental activity favorably contrasting with the stolid
indifference of the Fuegians seen by Forster at Christmas Harbor; and
Mr. Darwin is even of opinion that in general these people rise above
the Australians in mental power, although their actual acquirements may
be less.
The reason why the Fuegians are so little advanced in the arts of
life, are partly to be sought for in the nature of the land, and
partly in their political state. The perfect equality among the
individuals in each tribe must retard their civilization; and until
some chief shall arise with power sufficient to secure any acquired
advantage, such as the domesticated animals, it seems scarcely possible
that their condition can improve. But the chief causes of their
wretchedness are doubtless the barrenness of their country and their
constant forced migrations.
With the exception of the eastern part, the habitable land is reduced
to the stones on the beach. In search of food they are compelled to
wander from spot to spot; and so steep is the coast that they can
only move about in their canoes. Whenever it is low water, winter or
summer, night or day, they must rise to pick limpets from the rock; and
the women either dive to collect sea-eggs, or sit patiently in their
boats, and with a baited hair-line, without any hook, jerk out little
fish. If a seal is killed, or the floating carcass of a putrid whale
discovered, it is a feast; and such miserable food is assisted by a few
tasteless berries, chiefly of a dwarf arbutus, or by a globular bright
yellow fungus (_Cyttaria Darwini_), which grows in vast numbers on the
beech-trees. When young, it is elastic, with a smooth surface; but,
when mature, it shrinks, becomes tougher, and has its entire surface
deeply pitted or honey-combed. In this mature state it is collected in
large quantities by the women and children, and is eaten uncooked. It
has a mucilaginous, slightly sweet taste, with a faint smell like that
of a mushroom.
The necessity of protecting themselves against the extremity of cold,
and of obtaining their food from the sea, or by the chase of the
reindeer or the white bear, forces the Esquimaux to exert all their
faculties, and thus they have raised themselves considerably higher
in the scale of civilization than the Fuegians, whose mode of life
requires far less exertion of the mind. To knock a limpet from the rock
or to collect a fungus does not even call cunning into exercise. Living
chiefly upon shell-fish, they are obliged constantly to change their
abode, and thus they hardly bestow any thought on their dwellings,
which are more like the dens of wild beasts than the habitations of
human beings. The Fuegian wigwam consists of a few branches stuck in
the ground, and very imperfectly thatched on one side with a few tufts
of grass and rushes. The whole can not be the work of an hour, and it
is only used for a few days. At intervals, however, the inhabitants of
these wretched huts return to the same spot, as is evident from the
piles of old shells, often amounting to several tons in weight. These
heaps can be distinguished at a distance by the bright green color
of certain plants, such as the wild celery and scurvy grass, which
invariably grow on them.
The only articles in the manufacture of which the Fuegians show some
signs of ability are a few ornaments and their weapons, which again
are far inferior to those of the Esquimaux. Their bows are small and
badly shaped, their arrows, which are between two and three feet long,
feathered at one end and blunted at the other. The points are only
attached when the arrow is about to be used, and for this purpose the
archer carries them about with him in a leathern pouch. The shaft of
their larger spears is about ten feet long, and equally thick at both
ends. At one of the extremities is a fissure, into which a pointed bone
with a barbed hook is inserted and tightly bound with a thread. With
this weapon they most probably attack the seals; they also use it to
detach the shell-fish from the rocks below the surface of the water. A
second spear, longer and lighter than the first, with a barbed point,
serves most likely as a weapon of war; and a third one, much shorter
and comparatively thin, may perhaps be destined for the birds. The
females know how to make pretty necklaces of colored shells and baskets
of grass stalks. Here, as with all other races of mankind, we find the
germs of improvement, which only require for their development the
external impulse of more favorable circumstances.
[Illustration: 128. A FUEGIAN AND HIS FOOD.]
If it be asked whether they feel themselves as miserable as their
wretched appearance would lead us to believe them, it must be replied
that most travellers describe them as a cheerful, good-humored,
contented people; and as Mr. Darwin finely remarks, “Nature, by making
habit omnipotent and its effects hereditary, has fitted the Fuegian to
the climate and the productions of his country.”
The number of these savages is no doubt very small, as seldom more
than thirty or forty individuals are seen together. The interior of
the mountainous islands, which is as little known as the interior
of Spitzbergen, is no doubt completely uninhabited; as the coasts
alone, with the exception of the eastern and more level part of the
country, where the guanaco finds pasture, are able to furnish the
means of subsistence. The various tribes, separated from each other
by a deserted neutral territory, are nevertheless engaged in constant
feuds, as quarrels are perpetually arising about the possession of some
limpet-bank or fishing-station. When at war they are cannibals; and
it is equally certain that when pressed in winter by hunger they kill
and devour their old women before they kill their dogs, alleging as an
excuse that their dogs catch otters, and old women do not.
It has not been ascertained whether they have any distinct belief in a
future life. They sometimes bury their dead in caves, and sometimes in
the mountain forests. Each family or tribe has a wizard, or conjuring
doctor. Their language, of which there are several distinct dialects,
is likewise little known; it is, however, far inferior to the copious
and expressive vocabulary of the Esquimaux.
In 1830, while Captain Fitzroy was surveying the coasts of Fuegia,
he seized on a party of natives as hostages for the loss of a boat
which had been stolen, and some of these natives, as well as a child
belonging to another tribe, whom he bought for a pearl button, he took
with him to England, determining to educate them at his own expense.
One of them afterwards died of the smallpox; but a young girl, Fuegia
Basket, and two boys, Jemmy Button (thus named from his purchase-money)
and York Minster (so called from the great rugged mountain of York
Minster, near Christmas Sound), were placed in a school at Walthamstow,
and moreover had the honor of being presented to King William and
Queen Adelaide. Three years Jemmy and his companions remained in
England, at the end of which time Captain Fitzroy was again sent out to
continue the survey, and took with him these three Fuegians, intending
to return them to the place whence they had come. In this, however,
he was disappointed; but at their own request York and Fuegia were,
with Jemmy, deposited at Woollya, a pleasant looking spot in Ponsonby
Sound, belonging to Jemmy’s tribe. His family, consisting of his mother
and three brothers, was absent at the time, but they arrived the
following morning. Jemmy recognized the stentorian voice of one of his
brothers at a prodigious distance, but the meeting, as Mr. Darwin, who
witnessed the scene, relates, was less interesting than that between
a horse turned out into a field and an old companion. There was no
demonstration of affection; they simply stared for a short time at each
other. Three large wigwams were built for them, gardens planted, and
an abundant supply of every thing landed for their use. Jemmy, who had
become quite a favorite on board, was short and fat, but vain of his
personal appearance; he used always to wear gloves, his hair was neatly
cut, and he was distressed if his well-polished shoes were dirtied.
York was somewhat coarse and less intelligent, though in some things
he could be quick. He became attached to Fuegia, and as both were of
the same tribe, they became man and wife after their return to Tierra
del Fuego. She was the most intelligent of the three, and quick in
learning any thing, especially languages.
Thus these semi-civilized savages were left among their barbarous
countrymen, with the hope that they might become the means of improving
their whole tribe; but when Captain Fitzroy returned to the spot twelve
months after, he found the wigwams deserted and the gardens trampled
under foot. Jemmy came paddling up in his canoe, but the dandy who had
been left plump, clean, and well-dressed, was now turned into a thin,
haggard savage, with long, disordered hair, and naked, except a bit
of a blanket round his waist. He could still speak English, and said
that he had enough to eat, that he was not cold, and that his relations
were very good people. He had a wife besides, who was decidedly the
best-looking female in the company. With his usual good feeling, he
brought two beautiful otter skins for two of his best friends, and some
spearheads and arrows made with his own hands for the captain. He had
lost all his property. York Minster had built a large canoe, and with
his wife Fuegia had, several months since, gone to his own country,
and had taken farewell by an act of consummate villainy. He persuaded
Jemmy and his mother to come with him, and then on the way deserted
them by night, stealing every article of their property. It was the
opinion of all on board that the cunning rogue had planned all this
long before, and that with this end in view he had desired so earnestly
to remain with Jemmy’s tribe rather than be landed on his own country.
Eight years after an English vessel put into a bay in the Magellans for
water, and there was found a woman, without doubt Fuegia Basket, who
said, “How do? I have been to Plymouth and London.” York Minster was
also seen in 1851. From Captain Snow, commander of the mission yacht
“Allen Gardiner,” we have the last accounts of Jemmy Button in 1855.
Twenty-three years had not obliterated his knowledge of the English
language, but he was as wild and shaggy as his untaught countrymen.
In spite of his superior knowledge, he was treated as a very inferior
personage by the members of his tribe; yet he declared that though he
loved England, he loved his country still better; that nothing should
induce him to leave it, and that he would never allow any of his
children to quit their native soil.
Other efforts have been made to civilize the Fuegians. A Spanish vessel
having been shipwrecked on the eastern coast in 1767, its crew was
hospitably treated by the natives, who even assisted in saving the
cargo. Out of gratitude, the Governor of Buenos Ayres sent out some
missionaries, who, however, totally failed to make any impression on
the savages.
A no less unsuccessful attempt was made about the year 1835 by English
missionaries; and the expedition of Captain Gardiner, who, accompanied
by a surgeon, a catechist, and four Cornish fishermen, sailed to Fuegia
in 1851, with the intention of converting the natives, proved equally
fruitless, and had a far more tragic end. His measures for securing the
necessary supplies of food were so ill calculated that the whole party
died of hunger in Spaniards’ Harbor, on the southern coast. Captain
Morshead, of the “Dido,” had received orders on his way to Valparaiso
to visit the scene of the mission, and afford Captain Gardiner any aid
he might require, but, on arriving at the cove, he found it deserted.
After a few days’ search the bodies were discovered, and fragments of a
journal written by Captain Gardiner gave proof of the sufferings which
they had endured before death relieved them from their misery. The spot
has received the name of Starvation Beach.
[Illustration: 129. STARVATION BEACH.]
[Illustration: 130. SURVEYING IN GREENLAND.]