[1599] O’Brien, the Irish giant, was eight feet four inches high. His skeleton is in the College of Surgeons in London.
[1600] [Cf. note on the alleged height of the Patagonians in Thevet’s La France antarctique, Gaffarel’s ed., p. 287. Schouten testifies to finding bones in a grave ten feet and more of stature; and Pernetty’s Voyage aux Isles Malonines (Paris, 1770) gives the testimony of an engraving to their large stature (Field, Indian Bibliography, no. 1,200). There is a cut of two enormous Patagonians standing beside a European in Don Casimiro de Ortega’s Resumen histórico del primer viage hecho al rededor del mundo, emprendido por Hernando de Magallanes (Madrid, 1769). Statements of their unusual height have been insisted upon even in our day by travellers. One of the most trustworthy of recent explorers (1869-1870) of Patagonia, Lieutenant G. C. Musters, says that the men average six feet, some reaching six feet four inches; while the average of the women is five feet four.—Ed.]
[1601] Herrera gives the observation in some detail; but M. Charton says it was not visible there.
[1602] [See the section on “The Historical Chorography of South America.”—Ed.]
[1603] [For Gomez’ subsequent career see Dr. Shea’s chapter on “Ancient Florida,” in Vol. II., and- chapter i. of Vol. IV.—Ed.]
[1604] Juan de Barros.
[1605] Apium dulce.
[1606] See Cook’s First Voyage, i. 70, 74.
[1607] Pigafetta has preserved the vocabulary of ninety words which in this way he made. The words, he says, are to be pronounced in the throat. A few of the words are these: Ears, sanc; eyes, ather; nose, or; breast, othey; eyelids, sechechiel; nostrils, oresche; mouth, piam; a chief, hez.
[1608] This might have been inferred from Pigafetta’s map of the strait, in which the western shore of Patagonia and Chili are well laid in; but that inference seems to have escaped the globe-makers.