123. STRAIT OF MAGELLAN.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
THE STRAIT OF MAGELLAN.
Description of the Strait.—Western Entrance.—Point Dungeness.—The Narrows.—Saint Philip’s Bay.—Cape Froward.—Grand Scenery.—Port Famine.—The Sedger River.—Darwin’s Ascent of Mount Tarn.—The Bachelor River.—English Reach.—Sea Reach.—South Desolation.—Harbor of Mercy.—Williwaws.—Discovery of the Strait by Magellan (October 20, 1521).—Drake.—Sarmiento.—Cavendish.—Schouten and Le Maire.—Byron.—Bougainville.—Wallis and Carteret.—King and Fitzroy.—Settlement at Punta Arenas.—Increasing Passage through the Strait.—A future Highway of Commerce.
The celebrated strait which bears the name of Magellan is generally pictured as the scene of a wild and dreary desolation; but though its climate is far from being genial, and its skies are often veiled with mists and rain, yet nature can smile even here.
A glance at the map shows us the extreme irregularity of its formation, as it is constantly changing in width and direction; now swelling almost to the magnitude of a Mediterranean Sea, and then again contracting to a narrow passage; sometimes taking a rapid turn to the north, and at others as suddenly deviating to the south. Islands and islets of every form—some mere naked rocks, others clothed with umbrageous woods—are scattered over its surface; promontories without number, from the Patagonian mainland or the Fuegian archipelago, protrude their bold fronts into its bosom, as if with the intention of closing it altogether; and countless bays and havens are scooped into its rocky shores, as if the sea in a thousand different places had striven to open a new passage to her waters.
The western entrance of this remarkable strait is formed by Queen Catherine’s Foreland (Cape Virgins) and Point Dungeness, the latter having been thus named from its resemblance to the well-known Kentish promontory at the eastern mouth of the channel. Although it rises at most nine feet above low-water mark, the snow-white breakers which the tides are constantly dashing over its sides render it visible from a great distance. It is generally the resort of a number of sea-lions. When the wind comes blowing from the north-east, the passing mariner—who, from the shallow nature of the shore, is obliged to keep at some distance from the Ness—hears their hoarse bellowing, which harmonizes well with the wild and desolate character of the scene. Albatrosses and petrels hover about them, while rows of grave-looking penguins seem to contemplate their doings with philosophic indifference.
Beyond these promontories the strait widens into Possession Bay, which at Punta Delgada and Cape Orange contracts to a narrow passage. This leads into a wide basin, to which the Spaniards have given the name of Saint Philip’s Bay, and which again terminates in a second narrow passage or channel, a formation resembling on a small scale the Sea of Marmora, which, as we all know, has likewise the semblance of a lake, receiving and discharging its waters through the Dardanelles and the Strait of Constantinople. During the rising of the flood, a strong current flows through all these bays and narrows from the west, so as to allow ships an easy passage, even against the wind; but during ebb tide the current turns to the east, so that at this time a vessel, even when favored by the wind, makes but little progress, or is even obliged to anchor to avoid losing ground. When Magellan, after sailing round Cape Virgins, penetrated into the strait, this circumstance at once convinced that great navigator that he was not in an inclosed bay, but in an open channel, which would lead him into another ocean. Thus far the country on both sides of the strait consists of nearly level plains, like those of Patagonia; but beyond the second Narrows the land begins to assume the more bold and picturesque appearance which is characteristic of Tierra del Fuego. Mountains rise above mountains with deep intervening valleys, all covered by one thick, dusky mass of forest; while farther to the east scarcely a bush clothes the naked soil. The trees reach to an elevation of between 1000 and 1500 feet, and are succeeded by a band of peat, with minute Alpine plants, and this again is succeeded by the line of perpetual snow, which, according to Captain King, descends to between 3000 and 4000 feet.
The finest scenery about the Strait of Magellan is undoubtedly to the east of Cape Froward, the most southerly point of the mainland of South America. This promontory, which consists of a steep mass of rock about 800 feet high, abutting from a mountain chain of about 2000 or 3000 feet in height, forms the boundary between two very different climates, for to the east the weather is finer and more agreeable than to the west, where wind and rain are almost perpetual.
On the Patagonian plains, the drought and the want of protection against the piercing winds almost entirely impede vegetation; but the country between Cape Negro—a little within the second Narrows—and Cape Froward, or the eastern shore of Brunswick Peninsula, is shielded by its situation against the almost perpetual storms from the west, and enjoys, moreover, a sufficiency of rain, and now and then serene weather. As, moreover, the soil in this central part of the strait consists of disintegrated clay-slate, which is most favorable to the growth of trees, the forests, from all these causes, are finer here than anywhere else.