worn by the women as a succedaneum for a fig-leaf.  The men wear their cloak open, the women tie it about their waist with a thong.  But although they are content to be naked, they are very ambitious to be fine.  Their faces were painted in various forms:  The region of the eye was in general white, and the rest of the face adorned with horizontal streaks of red and black; yet scarcely any two were exactly alike.  This decoration seems to be more profuse and elaborate upon particular occasions, for the two gentlemen who introduced Mr Banks and the doctor into the town, were almost covered with streaks of black in all directions, so as to make a very striking appearance.  Both men and women wore bracelets of such beads as they could make themselves of small shells or bones; the women both upon their wrists and ancles, the men upon their wrists only; but to compensate for the want of bracelets on their legs, they wore a kind of fillet of brown worsted round their heads.  They seemed to set a particular value upon any thing that was red, and preferred beads even to a knife or a hatchet.

Their language in general is guttural, and they express some of their words by a sound exactly like that which we make to clear the throat when any thing happens to obstruct it; yet they have words that would be deemed soft in the better languages of Europe.  Mr Banks learned what he supposes to be their name for beads and water.  When they wanted beads, instead of ribbons or other trifles, they said halleca; and when they were taken on shore from the ship, and by signs asked where water might be found, they made the sign of drinking, and pointing as well to the casks as the watering-place, cried Ooda.

We saw no appearance of their having any food but shellfish; for though seals were frequently seen near the shore, they seemed to have no implements for taking them.  The shell-fish are collected by the women, whose business it seems to be to attend at low water, with a basket in one hand, and a stick, pointed and barbed, in the other, and a satchel at their backs:  They loosen the limpets, and other fish that adhere to the rocks, with the stick, and put them into the basket; which, when full, they empty into the satchel.

The only things that we found among them in which there was the least appearance of neatness or ingenuity, were their weapons, which consisted of a bow and arrows.  The bow was not inelegantly made, and the arrows were the neatest that we had ever seen:  They were of wood, polished to the highest degree; and the point, which was of glass or flint, and barbed, was formed and fitted with wonderful dexterity.  We saw also some pieces of glass and flint among them unwrought, besides rings, buttons, cloth, and canvas, with other European commodities; they must, therefore, sometimes travel to the northward, for it was many years since any ship had been so far south as this part of Terra del Fuego.  We observed also, that they shewed no surprise at our fire-arms, with the use of which they appeared to be well acquainted; for they made signs to Mr Banks to shoot a seal which followed the boat, as they were going on shore from the ship.