Chapter VIII: Arrival of the “queen.”

_Jan. 4._ Early this morning a large party of our tribe set off to meet the coming troop from the north.

About 11 +A.M.+ a division of the approaching strangers appeared on a hill in sight of our encampment, and made a signal. Immediately there was a great rushing and shouting on our right, and on inquiring the cause, we were told that the Americans were coming. A few minutes of waiting, and we were saluted in the English tongue by strangers who proved to be two young sailors, named Henry Boruck and Harry Hassel. The former says he is from the city of New York, and landed here from the sealing vessel Tally, Captain Allen, of New London, Conn., May 20th, 1833. The latter says he hails from Washington, D. C., and left the schooner Elizabeth Jane, Captain Albertson, May 12th, 1833. Wild, thoughtless youths, they became dissatisfied with their situations on board their vessels, and resolved to run away and abandon themselves to the pleasures of savage life. But the poor fellows have “paid dear for their whistle,” and they have learned their folly at a high price. They now rue the day when they left the society and comforts of civilized life and planted their feet on these savage shores. They say they have suffered bitterly, and have sometimes desired death rather than life. Their clothes have been taken from them, and Henry wears an old, greasy, and cast-off skin mantle; while poor Harry, less fortunate, has not been able to obtain even that apology for a garment, and vainly endeavors to cover his nakedness with the shadow of an old tattered monkey-jacket and the remnant of a pair of duck trousers in which he left his vessel. These are his only garments by day and night, and he has suffered greatly with the cold during the long winter. These men have been with the savages about eight months, and have been constantly roaming since the winter broke up, stopping only a few days in a place. They have been, as they say, a great distance to the north, sometimes camping on the sea-shore, sometimes advancing far into the interior. They have been with the division of Santa Maria, who is now on her way back to Gregory’s Bay.

Yesterday an Indian of our tribe went out to meet them, and these young men, learning from him that two of their countrymen were here, left their company by stealth in the evening, and, travelling most of the night, arrived at our camp before noon to-day.

While all the Indians are mounted, these sailors are made to travel on foot with the dogs, and are often reproached with the name servant and slave. They are barefooted, and, being obliged to keep up with the horses on their journeyings over rough and smooth places, their feet are swollen, cracked, and sore. They are covered with dirt, and their beards have not been shaven or their hair cut since they came into the country. They are made to do the drudgery of the savages, such as catching their horses, leading them to water, gathering fagots, kindling their fires, roasting their meat, bringing their water, etc.

Instead of becoming chiefs and gratifying their baser passions at will, as they expected, they are deprived of every privilege, despised by the savages, and degraded to the most abject condition.

But although they now see their folly, they do not reform their lives, but are constantly exerting a baleful influence upon the Indians, teaching them the use of the vilest words, and thus demoralizing, if possible, these degraded natives. They are awfully profane, and they have taught the Indians to take that sacred name of which they have no knowledge in vain, and to trifle with the God of whose attributes they have never heard. Almost every sentence which comes from their lips is uttered with an oath, and we are constantly rebuking them for a habit which to them is like breathing.

With all the roughness and profanity of these poor sailors, their misery makes them glad to see us, and they beg to remain under our care and protection, hoping that we may help them on board of some vessel and thus end their dreadful exile.

They excite our painful sympathy. We pity them, but we dread their influence on these savages; for it is in deadly opposition to that which we are endeavoring to exert.

In the afternoon another American youth of only sixteen years, named Nicholas Druery, came to our camp on horseback in company with an Indian with whom he lives. He hails from Westerloo, N. Y. This young man belonged to the schooner Transport, Captain Bray, of Bristol, R. I. The schooner was wrecked on Tierra del Fuego in March, 1833. The crew were all saved and taken off by the Unicorn, Captain Low. Nicholas, preferring a savage life, left the Unicorn at Gregory’s Bay, and has been with the Indians ever since.

He tells us that there is a man named Daniel Smith, of New York, and also an Englishman and a Portuguese, who left their clan some time ago to search for a vessel in which they might leave the country. What had become of them, whether they had escaped or perished with hunger, or at the hands of the savages, he knew not. At evening Nicholas returned with his Indian master to the Queen’s camp, which he judged was about twelve miles from here, while Henry and Harry remain with us.

_Sabbath, Jan. 5._ The Indians have been interchanging visits with the Queen’s party during the day. We have not yet seen her Majesty, but one of us will probably go to her camp to-morrow. We are told that there are about five hundred Indians in her train. We learn also that many of these savages play at cards, which recreation they call _berrica_, and also at dice, which they call _terraci_. Ball-playing they call _sonkey_, and in this they have indulged largely to-day. Surely we have been preceded by missionaries in Patagonia, though not by ambassadors of the Lord Jesus. These poor, blind natives have not been told the story of redemption nor taught “the name which is above every name,” except to profane it. They know nothing of the Sabbath of rest and peace--nothing of its elevating and soul-inspiring joys.

They have learned to swear and gamble, to smoke and drink, but they have unlearned none of their original sins.

About sunset our attention was turned to the tent of Santa Rio, the Spaniard, by groanings, rattlings, and strange noises. We went immediately to him, and found him complaining of sickness and great pain. An Indian doctor was sitting upon him, moaning, wailing, sucking his thumbs, striking his breast, blowing through his fists, sucking the eyebrows and face of his patient, blowing upon him, and rattling over his head two bags of dry skins, in the form of junk-bottles, in which were a large quantity of pebbles.

This ceremony was continued a long time, until one would suppose that a well man would have fallen sick, and a sick man would have died.

By what we saw on this occasion we are led to think that these savages, like many of the more civilized races, believe in possession by evil spirits, and that these wild and superstitious measures are practised to exorcise them.

_Jan. 6._ The long-looked-for Patagonian Queen has at last arrived. She comes to us not in regal pomp and royal splendor, attended with a brilliant retinue of “peers of the realm,” but as a savage squaw with a few straggling attendants, and escorted hither by Mr. Arms, who went up to her camp this morning.

Santa Maria is an aged woman, tall, large, and well formed, with a mild and somewhat intelligent face. She is partially civilized; has visited the Falkland Islands, and converses tolerably well in Spanish. She appears amiable in her disposition, and we are pleased with her. She is now living, as we are told, with her fourth husband, whose name is Kahatech. She has four sons, viz., Parpon, Toorloon, Checo, and Bistante. The oldest is a captain in the clan.

On entering our tent the Queen offered me her hand with civility and kindness, and then introduced her husband, for whom she manifests much affection.

We prepared a dinner of boiled meat, and our royal guests partook with us in the best style we could offer. They seemed to relish the savory meat, and, as we furnished but one course, the dinner was soon despatched. Our conversation then turned on various subjects, and she inquired of us how long we would remain in her country, what goods we had brought, when there would be more vessels at the bay, etc., etc.

She also invited us, with great apparent cordiality, to go and live with her. This invitation we thought best to decline for the present, as we do not expect to find friends who will treat us with more kindness than the family of Louis.

On telling the Queen that I would visit her at her lodge in a few days, she insisted on my returning with her to-day and spending some time with her; and her importunity became so great that, after several excuses on my part, I assented to go with her at once, and made my preparations to leave.

We then presented her with a nice scarlet broadcloth cloak which we had made on board the Mary Jane on our voyage out. We also gave her a hatchet, several knives, thimbles, needles, etc., with which she seemed much gratified. She had detailed a fine horse for me, and we all mounted, and the cavalcade set out at near sundown for the royal camp. We found the distance not great, and as the summer twilight in this high latitude is prolonged, we arrived at the camp before it was ended. The Indians crowded around in great numbers to welcome their chief and to get a peep at the stranger.

I was invited immediately into the Queen’s tent, which is larger than any of the others, but made and furnished in the same general style. It is occupied by several families in her train.

Santa Maria dresses in a mantle of skins, wears a few beads around her wrists, and when she rides out wears a pair of boots made of the skin of a horse’s leg; but in none of her personal attire is she distinguished from a private individual. I supped with her and her husband on roast guanaco, and this ended, she prepared my bed of skins, and covered me with the care of a mother.

_Jan. 7._ On arising this morning the good old Queen brought me a piggin of water and a piece of soap to wash my hands and face. This was a novelty. It is the first time I have seen a Patagonian think of water to wash face or hands, or food or clothing.

After this ablution a good breakfast of boiled meat was provided, with salt to flavor it. After breakfast the old lady inquired how long I would stay, and when I told her that I must return to-day, she urged me to remain another night. She did all in her power to render my visit agreeable, and I have seldom been treated with more simple and genuine hospitality even in a civilized land. Finding that I could not be persuaded to remain over another night, she girded a horse for herself and another for me, and at 3 +P.M.+ we set out, and she escorted me back to our encampment, rested there a while, and then returned to her own quarters.

As I was about to leave her tent she presented me with a new guanaco mantle made in the best manner, and finely painted. She also gave me seven hen’s eggs from a hen which she kept in her wigwam with great care. At the time Mr. Arms visited her, she gave him a mantle made of lion-skin, the only one of the kind in her possession. Among the Queen’s household I saw a man whom the Indians call _padre_, and who acts as a kind of priest, though I cannot learn that he has any official duties to discharge except in burying the dead. The padre wears his hair and his mantle like the women, lives in celibacy, performs no hard labor, and is supported by others. All this, of course, comes from some former contact with the Catholics; it may be from intercourse with the Spaniards along the Rio Negro on the north, with an old and abandoned settlement at Port Desire, on the Atlantic coast, or another at Port Famine, within the Strait of Magellan. And it is not improbable that Santa Maria has been baptized by a Catholic priest, as her name would indicate.

As yet we have witnessed no death and no funeral rites among the savages, but we are told by some of Santa Maria’s party that when a man dies he is buried in a small hole in the ground, the padre treading down the earth over him, and that then his horses and dogs are all killed, and his tent frame and covering, his mantles, lasso, bolas, skins, and all that pertains to him, are burned, no vestige of the man, or of any thing that he possessed in life, remaining.

On inquiry as to the marriage ceremony, we were told that the lover purchases a wife with a horse or horses of her father, and that the nuptials are celebrated by killing and eating a horse. Polygamy is common among the Patagonians, and husbands and wives have little regard for fidelity, and part at will.