[Footnote 118: Probably the gradations have not been attended to, because the nice discrimination of ranks has not been deemed worth while in so poor a country. Perhaps the mestees and their gradations are all elevated to the rank of Spaniards, or all depressed to that of vassal Chilotans.--E.]

Both men and women of the Spanish population in Chiloé go barefooted, except a few of the principal families who sacrifice convenience to pride; as in a country so continually wet it is safer to go about with naked feet than to have them in wet coverings. The men universally wear the poncho. The houses, or hovels rather, are all built of wood, and the crevices are stopped with sheep-skin or rags. The roofs are all thatched; and the climate is so rainy that this soon rots and must be frequently renewed. These dwellings consist of a single room, in which the family, the cattle, and the poultry, are all accommodated. A few of the inhabitants who can afford superior accommodation, have houses divided into several apartments, wainscoted within, and roofed with deal. Being all of wood, fires are frequent occurrences; but as the houses are scattered, the mischief does not extend. Owing to the inclemency of the weather, and the miserable state of the roads, a family in the scattered and solitary situation in which the houses are placed, is often weeks, and sometimes months without any communication with their neighbours. There is neither hospital, physician, nor surgeon in the whole province. A sick person is laid in a bed or a heap of skins near a large fire, and remains there till recovery or death supervene. The missionaries who visited these islands could find no books from which to teach the children to read, and when they wished them to write there was no paper. Necessity produced a substitute, and they used wooden boards or tablets, on which they wrote with a substance which could be washed out. Such is the miserable situation of the Spanish inhabitants of the archipelago of Chiloe: yet they dare not leave their wretched birth-place in the hope of bettering their fortunes. The small-pox is hitherto unknown among them, and those, who have attempted to go elsewhere have been cut off by that loathsome disease. In 1783, the entire population of this dreary province amounted to 23,477, of whom 11,985 were of Spanish descent, and 11,492 Indians.

SECTION XIV.

Account of the Native Tribes inhabiting the southern extremity of South America [119].

[Footnote 119: This supplementary section or appendix is added to the second volume of Molina, apparently by the English translator, and is said to be chiefly extracted from the description of Patagonia by Falkner. As the subject is new and interesting, we have been induced to extend somewhat beyond the rigid letter of a collection of voyages and travels. The picture of man in varied circumstances of savage life, is one of the most important pieces of information to be derived from a collection such as that we have undertaken and where direct means of communicating that intelligence are unattainable, it is surely better to employ such as on be procured than none.--E.]

The poet Ercilla has made the name of the Araucanians so famous that it were improper now to change the appellation. But that denomination properly belongs only to these tribes of the Picunches who inhabit the country of Aranco[120]. The nations or tribes who inhabit the southern extremity of South America are known among themselves by the general names of Moluches and Puelches; the former signifying the warlike people, and the latter the eastern people.

[Footnote 120: It will easily be seen in the immediate sequel, that Falkner very improperly uses Picunches as a generic term, as it signifies in a limited manner the northern people. Molina most properly denominates the whole aborigines of Chili on both sides of the Andes, Chilese, as speaking one language, the Chili-dugu; names the tribes of Arauco and those in the same republican confederacy Araucanians; and gives distinct names like Falkner to the allied tribes: the Puelches, Cunchese, Huilliches, Pehuenches, and others. Falkner appears to have chosen to denominate the whole from the tribe whose dialect he first became acquainted with; and some others seem to select the Moluches as the parent tribe.--E.]

The Moluches or warlike people, are divided into the Picunches, or people of the north, the Pehuenches or people of the fine country, and Huilliches or people of the south. The Picunches inhabit the mountains from Coquimbo to somewhat below St Jago in Spanish Chili. The Pehuenches border on these to the north, and extend to the parallel of Valdivia. Both of these are included in history under the name of Araucanians[121]. Their long and obstinate wars with the Spaniards, with the Puelches and with each other, have greatly diminished their numbers; but they have been still more diminished by the havoc which has been made among them by brandy, that curse of the American Indians, for which they have often been known to sell their wives and children, and to engage in savage scenes of civil bloodshed, entailing wide and endless deadly feuds. The small-pox has nearly completed the work of war and drunkenness, and when Falkner left the country they could hardly muster four thousand men among them all.

[Footnote 121: This account differs essentially from the history we have just given from the writings of Molina, an intelligent native of Chili, which cannot be repeated in the short compass of a note.--E.]

The Huilliches possess the country from Valdivia to the Straits of Magellan. They are divided into four tribes, who are improperly classed together as one nation, since three of them are evidently of a different race from the fourth. That branch which reaches to the sea of Chiloé and beyond the lake of Nahuelhuaupi speaks the general language of Chili, differing only from the Pehuenches and Picunches in pronunciation. The others speak a mixed language, composed of the Moluche and Tehuel tongue, which latter is the Patagon; and these tribes, from their great stature, are evidently of Patagonian origin. Collectively these three tribes are called the Vuta-Huilliches, or great southern-people; separately they are named Chonos, Poy-yes, and Key-yes. The Chonos inhabit the archipelago of Chili, and the adjoining shores of the continent. The Poy-yes or Peyes possess the coast from lat. 48° to something more than 51° S. The Key-yes or Keyes extend from thence to the Straits of Magellan. The Moluches maintain some flocks of sheep, principally for the sake of their wool, and cultivate a small quantity of corn.