At the head of St. Estevan's Gulf is St. Quentin's Sound; both were examined and found to afford excellent anchorage, and they are both of easy access should a ship, passing up the coast, find herself upon a lee shore and not able to weather the land, as was the case with the ill-fated Wager[1].
The Guaianeco islands form the southern head of the Gulf of Peñas; then follows Wellington Island, separated from the main by the Mesier Channel, which had not been previously explored, its mouth only being laid down in the charts compiled from the information of Machado, a pilot who was sent in 1769 by the viceroy of Peru to examine the coast from Chiloe to the Strait of Magalhaens[2]. This channel is also noticed in one of the two missionary voyages above mentioned; but the object of these expeditions being for the purpose of converting the Indians to Christianity[3], and not for the extension of geographical knowledge, little information of that nature could be obtained from their journal: the entrance of the Mesier, however, is described by them; and on one occasion they were obliged to take refuge in it for fifteen days[4] With this exception I cannot find that it has ever been entered before our visit.
The length of the channel is one hundred and sixty miles, and it joins the Concepcion Strait behind the Madre de Dios archipelago, at the Braze Ancho of Sarmiento. Lieutenant Skyring, who superintended this particular part of the survey, called the land which it insulates, Wellington Island; the seaward-coast of which, bearing on the old chart the name of Campaña, is probably fronted by one or more islands. Failos Channel, which separates the Campaña and Wellington Islands, was examined, from its northern entrance, for thirty-three miles, and was conjectured, after communicating with the sea at Dynely Sound, to extend to the southward, and fall into the Guff of Trinidad by one of the deep sounds which were noticed on the north shore.
About thirty miles within the Mesier Channel, from the northern extremity, the west side appears to be formed by a succession of large islands, many of which are separated by wide channels lead-
- ↑ The precise situation of the wreck of this vessel had hitherto been very vaguely marked on our charts: a careful perusal, however, of Byron's narrative, and of Agueros's account of the Missionary Voyages in 1779, sufficiently point out the place within a few miles. It is on the north side, near the west end of the easternmost of the Guaianeco islands, which we named in consequence Wager Island. At Port Santa Barbara, seventeen miles to the southward of this group, a very old worm-eaten beam of a vessel was found, which there is re,on to think may be a relic of that fortunate ship. It was of English oak, and was found thrown up above the high-water mark upon the rocks at the entrance of the port. No other vestige was detected by us;—the missionaries, however, found broken glass bottles and other evident traces of the wreck. At Chiloe I saw a man who had formed one of this enterprising party, and obtained from him a curious and interesting account of voyages.
- ↑ Agueros, p. 205, et seq.
- ↑ Ibid. p. 181, et seq.
- ↑ Ibid. p. 237.
