about two o'clock in the afternoon
There was therefore absolutely no chance of the _ Union _ being missed should she come within twenty miles from the _ Angamos _ , for a man with a powerful telescope would be able to cover at least that distance from the cruiser 's fore-topmast head . But despite the strict look-out maintained aboard the _ Angamos _ , the days passed without any sign of the _ Union _ making her appearance . The gun-running vessels Jim did not expect to meet until several days after his arrival off the Straits of Magellan ; but he could not quite understand not having yet sighted the Peruvian corvette . Past Concepcion they swept , on the afternoon of the second day out from Valparaiso ; then past Valdivia , and still there was no sign of the enemy ; then Childe Island was dropped astern , and on the fifth day out at about two o'clock in the afternoon Cape Pillar , at the north end of Desolation Island and the entrance to the Straits , was sighted , but the sea was still bare of the ship of which they had come in search . Still , as Jim remembered , the _ Union _ was a very fast boat , only two knots slower than the _ Angamos _ herself , and he thought it not improbable that she might be found lurking somewhere among the numerous islands which make the navigation of Magellan Straits so difficult and dangerous . The young skipper therefore took his cruiser into every little creek and inlet that he came to , in the hope of finding his quarry there ; or , if the water was too shoal , sent away boat expeditions to explore . But still there was no sign of the _ Union _ , and a week after leaving Valparaiso the _ Angamos _ dropped her anchor off Punta Arenas , and Jim went ashore to interview the governor of that port , in the forlorn hope that he might have seen the Peruvian pass , or have heard something of her whereabouts .