Robert Fitzroy - Narrative of the surveying voyages of His Majesty's ships Adventure and Beagle, between the years 1826 and 1836

In Loyasa's voyage (1526), Herrera mentions an interview with the natives, who came in two canoes, "the sides of which were formed of the ribs of whales." The people in them were of large size "some called them giants; but there is so little conformity between the accounts given concerning them, that I shall be silent on the subject." 72 72 Ibid. p. 135.

As Loyasa's voyage was undertaken immediately after the return of Magalhaens' expedition, it is probable that, from the impressions received from Pigafetta's narrative, many thought the Indians whom they met must be giants, whilst others, not finding them so large as they expected, spoke more cautiously on the subject; but the people seen by them must have been Fuegians, and not those whom we now recognise by the name of Patagonians.

Sir Francis Drake's fleet put into Port San Julian, where they found natives 'of large stature;' and the author of the 'World Encompassed,' in which the above voyage is detailed, speaking of their size and height, supposes the name given them to have been Pentagones , to denote a stature of "five cubits, viz. seven feet and a half," and remarks that it described the full height, if not somewhat more, of the tallest of them. 73 73 Burney, i. 318. They spoke of the Indians whom they met within the Strait as small in stature. 74 74 Ibid, i. 324.

The next navigator who passed through the Strait was Sarmiento; whose narrative says little in proof of the very superior size of the Patagonians. He merely calls them "Gente Grande," 75 75 Sarmiento, p. 244. and "los Gigantes;" but this might have originated from the account of Magalhaens' voyage. He particularises but one Indian, whom they made prisoner, and only says "his limbs are of large size: " ("Es crecido de miembros.") This man was a native of the land near Cape Monmouth, and, therefore, a Fuegian. Sarmiento was afterwards in the neighbourhood of Gregory Bay, and had an encounter with the Indians, in which he and others were wounded; but he does not speak of them as being unusually tall.

After the establishment, called 'Jesus,' was formed by Sarmiento, in the very spot where 'giants' had been seen, no people of large stature are mentioned, in the account of the colony; but Tomé Hernandez, when examined before the Vice-Roy of Peru, stated, "that the Indians of the plains, who are giants, communicate with the natives of Tierra del Fuego, who are like them." 76 76 Sarmiento's Appendix, xxix.

Anthony Knyvet's account 77 77 Purchas, iv. ch. 6 and 7. of Cavendish's second voyage (which is contained in Purchas), is not considered credible. He describes the Patagonians to be fifteen or sixteen spans in height; and that of these cannibals, there came to them at one time above a thousand! The Indians at Port Famine, in the same narrative, are mentioned as a kind of strange cannibals, short of body, not above five or six spans high, very strong, and thick made. 78 78 Burney, ii. p. 106.

The natives, who were so inhumanly murdered by Oliver Van Noort, on the Island of Santa Maria (near Elizabeth Island), were described to be nearly of the same stature as the common people in Holland, and were remarked to be broad and high-chested. Some captives were taken on board, and one, a boy, informed the crew that there was a tribe living farther in-land, named 'Tiremenen,' and their territory 'Coin;' that they were "great people, like giants, being from ten to twelve feet high, and that they came to make war against the other tribes, 79 79 The tribes described by this boy are the whom they reproached for being eaters of ostriches!" 80 80 Burney, ii, 215.

Spilbergen (1615) says he "saw a man of extraordinary stature, who kept on the higher grounds to observe the ships;" and on an island, near the entrance of the Strait, were found the dead bodies of two natives, wrapped in the skins of penguins, and very lightly covered with earth; one of them was of the common human stature, the other, the journal says, was two feet and a half longer. 81 81 Ibid. ii. 334. The gigantic appearance of the man on the hills may perhaps be explained by the optical deception we ourselves experienced.

Le Maire and Schouten, whose accounts of the graves of the Patagonians agree precisely with what we noticed at Sea Bear Bay, of the body being laid on the ground covered with a heap of stones, describe the skeletons as measuring ten or eleven feet in length, "the skulls of which we could put on our heads in the manner of helmets!"

The Nodales did not see any people on the northern side of the Strait; those with whom they communicated were natives of Tierra del Fuego, of whose form no particular notice is taken.

Sir John Narborough saw Indians at Port San Julian, and describes them as "people of a middling stature: well-shaped. … Mr. Wood was taller than any of them." He also had an interview with nineteen natives upon Elizabeth Island, but they were Fuegians.

In the year 1741, Patagonian Indians were seen by Bulkley and his companions. They were mounted on horses, or mules, which is the first notice we have of their possessing those animals.

Duclos de Guyot, in the year 1766, had an interview with seven Patagonian Indians, who were mounted on horses equipped with saddles, bridles, and stirrups. The shortest of the men measured five feet eleven inches and a quarter English. The others were considerably taller. Their chief or leader they called 'Capitan.'

Bougainville, in 1767, landed amongst the Patagonians. Of their size he remarks: "They have a fine shape; among those whom we saw, not one was below five feet ten inches and a quarter (English), nor above six feet two inches and a half in height. Their gigantic appearance arises from their prodigiously broad shoulders, the size of their heads, and the thickness of all their limbs. They are robust and well fed: their nerves are braced and their muscles strong, and sufficiently hard, &c." This is an excellent account; but how different is that of Commodore Byron, who says, "One of them, who afterwards appeared to be chief, came towards me; he was of gigantic stature, and seemed to realise the tales of monsters in a human shape: he had the skin of some wild beast thrown over his shoulders, as a Scotch Highlander wears his plaid, and was painted so as to make the most hideous appearance I ever beheld: round one eye was a large circle of white, a circle of black surrounded the other, and the rest of his body was streaked with paint of different colours. I did not measure him; but if I may judge of his height by the proportion of his stature to my own, it could not be less than seven feet. When this frightful colossus came up, we muttered somewhat to each other as a salutation, &c." 82 82 Hawksworth's Coll. i 28. After this he mentions a woman "of most enormous size;" and again, when Mr. Cumming, the lieutenant, joined him, the commodore says, "Before the song was finished, Mr. Cumming came up with the tobacco, and I could not but smile at the astonishment which I saw expressed in his countenance upon perceiving himself, though six feet two inches high, become at once a pigmy among giants, for these people may, indeed, more properly be called giants than tall men: of the few among us who are full six feet high, scarcely any are broad and muscular, in proportion to their stature, but look rather like men of the common bulk grown up accidentally to an unusual height; and a man who should measure only six feet two inches, and equally exceed a stout well-set man of the common stature in breadth and muscle, would strike us rather as being of a gigantic race, than as an individual accidentally anomalous; our sensations, therefore, upon seeing five hundred people, the shortest of whom were at least four inches taller, and bulky in proportion, may be easily imagined." 83 83 Ibid.