The same enterprising Menendez has several other farms, the most promising of which is across the Strait, and to this our eyes were directed with considerable pride by our host. This farm occupies the lowlands of north-eastern Tierra del Fuego, which is said to be the best sheep land of the entire region. Here, upon about 120,000 acres, there are 150,000 sheep turning wool into gold faster than any gold mines could be expected to offer yellow metal.
Mr. Menendez, however, like all managers of great enterprises, had his troubles: “Sheep farming is very profitable,” said he, “but we have one great difficulty—it is to secure good help.” This ought to be a cheerful notice to the unemployed thousands of Europe and America, but it should be accepted with a proper appreciation of the life and work in question. A Patagonian shepherd lives the life of a wild man. In the saddle he roams about on the pampas with his sheep, and at night he makes camp like an Indian. But there are many men who enjoy just such a life, and for such there is plenty of room in this region. The usual pay is about thirty dollars (gold) per month, but expenses are next to nothing, and an additional income is added to the regular pay by the products of hunting, such as ostrich feathers, guanaco skins, etc. The men at present employed are mostly Scotch shepherds, but some of the best ranchmen have been made from ordinary seamen. In the newer methods of shearing and other improved mechanical contrivances, machinists and other artisans are in demand. Many of the men who have come here as workmen are now ranch-owners themselves, and few who have once tasted the elixir of pampa life ever leave it again for the noise and the strife and the gilded glitter of the upper world.
When we again mounted our horses to return, we were somewhat disposed to lay aside polar exploration and become sheep farmers, but this idea was soon dissipated by our efforts to return to the Belgica. The purple twilight was just deepening into the darker shades of night as we left the little group of buildings which constitute the headquarters of the Menendez ranch. The horses seemed more than ever opposed to their inexperienced riders, and our discomfort was such that we did not hurry them. We preferred to leave to them the selection of the path, and the rate of progress, while we drank in the sharp antarctic air and enjoyed the glory of the night scene. It was nearly midnight when we reached our canoe. Here we found our companions impatiently waiting for us, some seated on boulders, others stretched out on the grass, and a few chatting with the shepherds in the nearest hut. But we were somewhat dejected as we gazed upon the sight before us; the water had run out with the tide to such an extent as to leave our boat high and dry some three or four hundred feet from the nearest launching-place. Every foot of this distance had on it a covering of a soft semi-liquid mixture of clay, sand, small stones, and shellfish. The Belgica must start with the tide at daybreak, and her whistles were already tooting the signal to hasten on board. To wait for the tide was impossible, so we started our canoe over the debris. If the surface had been tar it could not have offered more resistance, nor could it have caused more discomfort. After an hour of almost superhuman effort we reached the water, but we were covered with slime and mud and perspiration from head to foot, and we agreed that our first Patagonian debarkment was a decidedly expensive luxury.
We reached the Belgica as the eastern skies brightened with the coming morning twilight. The anchor was raised immediately, and while our aching muscles were resting, we were transported through the second narrows to Elizabeth Island. In three hours we were opposite the island and accordingly prepared for another debarkment. Our object in stopping here was principally to obtain a supply of the wild geese for which this island is noted. We landed in a cave near a lonely shepherd’s hut, and scattered over the island, being careful to leave two men to keep the canoe afloat that we might not renew our experience of the previous night.
We found the geese extremely numerous, but either they were too well acquainted with firearms, or our workmen had been too long seasick, for, from the result of our hunt, we were able to produce only a dozen birds. Elizabeth Island, like all of the grassy ground of this region, is devoted to the interests of sheep-farming. It is upon this notable island that the first Magellanic sheep-farming experiment was made. Mr. H. I. Reynard, an Englishman living in Punta Arenas, first conceived the idea early in the seventies. Perceiving that sheep and cattle thrived in the Falkland Islands, whose climate and vegetation was in most respects similar enough to that of Elizabeth Island to warrant the expenditure necessary for a proper trial, he accordingly established here the first sheep colony. The sheep took so kindly to their new home, and multiplied so rapidly that, though the island is eight miles long and two miles wide, it was very quickly so thickly stocked that numbers of the sheep were transferred to the mainland. From this experiment in farming Mr. Reynard was reported, in 1894, to be enjoying the princely income of a hundred thousand dollars annually.
Among our collections from this island were a number of flint arrows and spear points, which seem to be abundant in the numerous heaps of mussel shells and other sites of old Indian encampments. But the island has long been deserted by the Indians, for, even at the time of its discovery by Drake, three hundred years ago, none are mentioned. The discovery and naming of this island is thus described by the old records: “The 24th of August (1578) being Bartholomew’s day, we fell in with three islands bearing trianglewise one from another; one of them was very fair and large and of a fruitful soil, upon which, being next unto us, and the weather very calm, our General with his gentlemen and certain of his mariners then landed, taking possession thereof in her Majesty’s name, and to her use, and calling the same Elizabeth Island.” The other islands are those now known as Santa Marta, and Santa Magdalena Islands, upon which Drake found penguins so numerous, that, in one day, not less than three thousand were taken and subsequently used as food.
The Wind-swept Rocks of the Western Fuegian Islands.
We left Elizabeth Island at 10 o’clock in a mist of cold, drizzly rain and steered westward close to its low sandy cliffs. The mist occasionally raised and gave us a glimpse of the land. There is a ridge of small hills running parallel to its length through the centre, the highest of these being one hundred and eighty feet above the sea. The hills were made more conspicuous by various clusters of a bluish shrub, but aside from these there were no trees and nothing but the hardy pampa grass to cover the sandy soil; nevertheless, with its shepherds’ huts, and its vast herds of sheep, Elizabeth Island is not without an air of attractiveness.
At noon the atmosphere had cleared and the ever-present dark, feathery clusters of vapour shaded the water and gave it a despairing blackness. Over our port bow a low buff-colored point extended far out into the widening strait. This was our first sight of the famous Sandy Point, whose notoriety is sure to reach the ears of every South American voyager. Here also we noticed a striking change in the topography of the land and in the character of the vegetation. We had left the smooth, treeless pampas behind us, and before us appeared a wild rugged country, the lowlands covered by a dense forest, and the highlands white with snow. These were the the foot-hills of the terminating Andes, a place well calculated to shelter the Cape Horn capital from the never-ceasing stormy blasts.