There may be some survivors ashore trying to signal us."
But we sailed on, and no signals were seen. Mr. Pike was delighted
with our good fortune. He was guilty of walking up and down, rubbing
his hands and chuckling to himself. Not since 1888, he told me, had
he been through the Straits of Le Maire. Also, he said that he knew
of shipmasters who had made forty voyages around the Horn and had
never once had the luck to win through the straits. The regular
passage is far to the east around Staten Island, which means a loss
of westing, and here, at the tip of the world, where the great west
wind, unobstructed by any land, sweeps round and around the narrow
girth of earth, westing is the thing that has to be fought for mile
by mile and inch by inch. The Sailing Directions advise masters on
the Horn passage: Make Westing. WHATEVER YOU DO, MAKE WESTING.
When we emerged from the straits in the early afternoon the same
steady breeze continued, and in the calm water under the lee of
Tierra del Fuego, which extends south-westerly to the Horn, we
slipped along at an eight-knot clip.
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