1.If you look at a map of South America,you will see that a large piece of land is cut off from the south end by a narrow winding strait or channel.By this channel ships cross from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean.It is so narrow in some parts that,on one occasion,the captain of a steamship was knocked off the bridge of his ship by the branch of a tree which he was passing.Yet the water was quite deep enough for the ship.
2.This channel is called Magellan Strait,after the first traveller who sailed through it.The land which is cut off by it consists of one large island about the size of Scotland,and a number of smaller ones.The whole group was named Tierra del Fuego,or Land of Fire,by Magellan,and English people who live near it generally call it Fire land.
3.The land is very mountainous.The lower slopes of the mountains are clothed with thick forests,while their tops are covered with snow all the year round.
4.The weather in Fire land is very cold and stormy,and it is said that one fine day in three months is as much as can be expected.Even in summer snow-storms are common.The wind blows with great force,and the passage round Cape Horn,the extreme south point of Fire land,is much feared by sailors.A ship may be stopped for weeks by gales and head winds.
5.The people who live in this dreary land are called Fuegians,or Canoe Indians.They are a different race from those who live to the north of the strait.They are savages of the very lowest kind.They wear little or no clothing,though their country is so cold.A short fur cloak made from the skin of the sea-otter is their only clothing,and even this is often wanting.
6.Many of their customs are very cruel.All hard work,such as fishing and gathering shell-fish for food,is done by the women,who have to swim and dive in the ice-cold water.When food is scarce,which is often the ease,the old people are sometimes killed in order to leave more food for the others.
7.They have no laws.They do not even live in tribes under a chief,as most savages do.They have no religion.But at the present time there are mis-sionaries in that dreary land trying to teach the people and to improve their manner of living.
8.The natives suffer much from the cold,as you can easily believe,and they are very fond of being near a fire.They light a fire when they stop,for however short a time;and they may even be seen carrying a piece of burning wood when going from one place to another,so as to light a new fire when they stop again.In their canoes,also,they have a kind of clay hearth,where a fire is kept burning while they are fishing or sailing from place to place.
10.You can now see why this country is called Fireland.The natives are never seen without fires burning in some place near them,and it was from the number of these fires that Magellan called it the Land of Fire.
11.These poor Indians do not live in houses or in tents.When they stop for a few days at any part of the coast,they set up a shelter of branches of trees covered over with grass.But they rarely stay long in one place.When they have gathered the shell-fish from one part of the beach,they move on a little further.
12.The ground is so steep and rocky that they generally travel along the shore in their canoes,and this is the reason why they are sometimes called Canoe Indians.As they walk so little,their limbs are small and weak;while their head and shoulders look very large for the size of their bodies.
13.They do not cultivate the ground,and their only vegetable food consists of some berries that grow on a small bush,and a kind of large yellow mushroom .
Their only tame animal is the dog,which they train to help them in catching fish.
