sked. "We have no chance of trading with such
people; and if we were to kill a few, what would it matter?"

"They have souls, Master Golding," said I, for I could not keep silence;
"and souls, I have learned, are precious things."

A scornful laugh was his reply, and he still kept his musket ready, as
if to fire. The savages, however, seemed in no way afraid, but lifted
up their hands, and made as if they too had muskets; and when we laughed
they laughed, and when we shook our fists they shook theirs; and so we
discovered that, though hideous, they were a harmless race, and great
mimics. They readily accepted beads, and knives, and coloured
handkerchiefs, and such like things.

These people, we learn from Tony Hinks, who has before been on the coast
(indeed where has he not been?) are different from the tribes of
Patagonians who inhabit the country to the north as far as the Spanish
settlements. These latter are a fierce race, often of large stature,
though not giants, as some suppose, and dress in skins and ride on
horseback. Again, there are other tribes whose dwellings are among the
marshes and inlets of the sea up the Straits of Magellan. They move
about only in their canoes, living on shell-fish, seals' flesh, and
fish, their habits being more filthy and disgusting even than are those
of our present friends. Phineas laughs at the notion of their being our
fellow-creatures, and says that they must have sprung from apes; but
Tony, who has seen many strange people, says that he would not give a
fig for the supercargo's opinion, for that he has known white men become
almost as brutish in their appearance, and much more brutish in their
manners, just from living a few years among born savages, cut off from
all communication with their fellow whites. A little practical
experience often shows the folly of these would-be philosophers.

On the Pacific coast of this end of America are found the unsubdued
tribes of the Araucanians in vast numbers, so that in this one small
portion of the continent are many hundred thousand savages, all lying in
the midnight of heathen darkness.

Phineas observes that it is a pity they cannot be swept away, and
civilised men, with whom it would be an advantage to trade, introduced
in their stead. He esteems men in proportion as they are able to
exchange gold dust, ivory, spices or precious stones, not knowing their
value, for glass beads and Brummagem knives and needles. I cannot