MAGELLAN, STRAIT OF (ante). Since steamships have been used for long voy- ages the strait of Magellan has acquired a new importance. On account of its fogs, precipitous shores, numerous hidden rocks, and sudden squalls, it had come to be. avoided by sailing vessels, which found the circuit of cape Horn far less perilous. Care ful observations, rnade by the steamers of many nations in its passage, have been recorded to an extent that makes it at the present time comparatively safe for steamers_ Entering. from the east through Desolation bay, its shores are low, reddish, and sandy. Further in, the strait varies in width from I of a, mile to 15 miles, and as the center is reached the shores become precipitous, conveying the impression that they had once. joined, and had been parted by some great convulsion of nature. Their height varies from a few feet to many hundred , with high mountains rising behind them on the. n. side, and round-topped hills on the s. or Terra del Fuego side. The most direct passage through to the Pacific is at cape Pillar, a point nearly s.w. of the entrance on the Atlantic, where lofty rocks on each side of a passao'e less than a mile wide form a. gateway to the open Pacific. Sandy point, on the n. shore, lies about inidway of the strait, and is the only settlement of whites. The Chilian government here has a penal colony. Port Famine, the scene of a sad tragedy of starvation nearly 300 years ago, lies to the west. North of the cape Pillar channel the strait opens by innumerable passages through an archipelago of barren rocky islands to the Pacific. But the cluumel now generally taken is an inland one from the strait on the s., by a passage known as Smyth's
channel, about 350 m. long, to the stormy gulf of Penas on the n., where it connect.% with the open sea. The most picturesque and alpine part of the scenery of the strait is near the w. end, where lofty snow-covered ranges, cloven peaks, great glaciers, and valleys filled with somber forests, as seen from passing steamers, form a changing pano rama of unique beauty. Mrs. Agassiz has described it vividly in the Atlantic Monthly of Jan., 1873. The scientific expedition of which Agassiz was the leader spent seieral, months in the strait in 1871, and its reports are the fullest ever made, not only of their general features, but also of their scientific bearings. Dirs. Agassiz speaks of banks of wildk fuchsias found in bloom there in March, which indicates that, however low the average temperature, the extreme, by the sea-side, is not low. Chili now claims the country con tiguous to the straits, though Paraguay disputes the claim. Th4 natives of Patagonia on the n. side and of Terra del Fuego on the s. are widely different; the former being noted., for their great stature and good forms, and the latter for small size, bad forms, and degraded condition. Seals are found in abundance in the strait, but not the species , bearing the most valuable fur. Besides recent works and reports on the strait already alluded to, the Voyage round th.e TVorld by Charles Darwin, reprinted, New York, 1878; Adventures in Patagonia, by rev. T. Coan, 1880; and Les Haees Magellanique, by Duboc, Paris, 1853, are among the most instructive.