"None can reply--all seems eternal now.
The wilderness has a mysterious tongue,
Which teaches awful doubt."
(8/11. Shelley, Lines on Mt. Blanc.)
One day the yawl was sent under the command of Mr. Chaffers with
three days' provisions to survey the upper part of the harbour. In
the morning we searched for some watering-places mentioned in an
old Spanish chart. We found one creek, at the head of which there
was a trickling rill (the first we had seen) of brackish water.
Here the tide compelled us to wait several hours; and in the
interval I walked some miles into the interior. The plain as usual
consisted of gravel, mingled with soil resembling chalk in
appearance, but very different from it in nature. From the softness
of these materials it was worn into many gulleys. There was not a
tree, and, excepting the guanaco, which stood on the hilltop a
watchful sentinel over its herd, scarcely an animal or a bird. All
was stillness and desolation. Yet in passing over these scenes,
without one bright object near, an ill-defined but strong sense of
pleasure is vividly excited. One asked how many ages the plain had
thus lasted, and how many more it was doomed thus to continue.
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