After once more landing some pigs, with which he wished to endow New Zealand, the captain set sail for Cape Horn on the 10th of November. After a vain cruise, he at last sighted the eastern shore of Tierra del Fuego, near the entrance to the Straits of Magellan.
"The portion of America which now met our view," says Cook, "was dreary enough. It seemed to be cut up into small islands, which though by no means high, were very black, and almost entirely barren. In the background, we saw high ground covered with snow, almost to the water's edge. It is the wildest shore I have ever seen, and appears entirely composed of mountains and rocks, without a vestige of vegetation. The mountains overhang horrible precipices, the sharp peaks of which arise to great height. Probably there is nothing in nature which presents so wild an appearance. The interior mountains are covered with snow, but those bordering the sea are not. We imagined the former to belong to Tierra del Fuego, and the latter to be ranged over the small islands in such a way as to present the appearance of an uninterrupted coast."
The captain still thought it better to remain some time in this desolate region, to procure fresh victuals for his crew. He found safe anchorage in Christmas Sound, where as usual, he made a careful hydrographical survey.
| View of Christmas Sound. |
Several birds were shot, and Mr. Pickersgill brought three hundred sea-gull's eggs and fourteen geese on board.
"I was thus enabled," says Cook, "to distribute them to the entire crew, a fact which gave the greater satisfaction as it was near Christmas. Without this timely supply, they must have contented themselves with beef and salt pork."
Some of the natives, belonging to the nation called "Pecherais" by Bougainville, came on board without any pressing. Cook's description of these savages recalls that of the French explorer. They preferred the oily portions of the flesh of the seals upon which they lived—a taste which Cook attributed to the fact that the oil warmed their blood, and enabled them to resist the intense cold.
"If," he adds, "the superiority of a civilized to a savage life could ever be called in question, a single glance at one of these Indians would be sufficient to settle the question. Until it is proved that a man perpetually tortured by the rigour of a climate is happy, I shall never give in to the eloquent declamations of those philosophers who have never had the opportunity of observing human nature in all its phases, or who have not felt what they have seen."
The Resolution at once set sail and doubled Cape Horn. The Strait of Lemaire was then crossed, and Staten Island reconnoitred. Here a good anchorage was found. Quantities of whales abound in these latitudes. It was now their pairing season, and seals and sea-lions, penguins and garnets appeared in shoals.