The buildings of Port Famine having been fired, the Government, after deciding on a re-establishment of the colony, selected for the site of its town a long tongue of sandy ground a few miles farther north. This is the site of the present famous town, Punta Arenas, and it takes its name from the sandy point on which it rests. Punta Arenas, or Sandy Point, like the first colony, had as its principal reason for existence a penal settlement, and its population was composed of men of the same class--mental and moral outcasts, revolutionists and high-handed criminals. The new town met a fate similar to that of the first settlement. The prisoners revolted and, assisted by the soldiers who were sent to protect the town, they sought the Governor. But to keep his own blood from being spilled, this unworthy official deserted his wife and children, and left for parts unknown. They caught the commander of the garrison, and massacred him in a shocking manner, after which they took the town and held a sort of drunken festivity for three days. The Governor, in his retreat, had found a Chilean cruiser, and as this came in sight of the town the rioters, to save their necks, took to the pampas. Here most of the miscreants came to a miserable death by starvation, fatigue, and cold. A few reached the Chubut River and were taken to Buenos Aires, where the liberty for which they had struggled was given them. This last destruction of the colony occurred in 1877. At this time Punta Arenas had already risen to some importance. It numbered, among its exile settlers, several independent citizens; and these were the creators of the true Magellanic metropolis. No more prisoners were sent. The town was left to live and flourish, according to its resources, or to die a natural death. Fortunately, its resources had already been discovered. Some of the desert-like pampas, upon which the liberators famished, had been stocked with sheep, and they thrived unexpectedly. Gold had been found in the creeks, coal had been found but a short distance off, the forest appeared inexhaustible, and steamers were beginning to cut the solitude of the Strait. Dissatisfied, rejected and venturous sailors cast in their lots with the builders of the town. Shepherds, gold-diggers, traders, adventurous wanderers, and striplings from the world’s population--a heterogeneous mixture--came to rest here as a last resort. The semi-Yankee life of Punta Arenas takes its origin from this mass, and the town owes its growth, very largely, to the fact that its site is a terminal morain to a restless stream of human life.