Page:A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 1.djvu/321

Between the Archipelagos.]

miles distance, in from 7 to 11 fathoms water. The latitude at noon from very indifferent observations, was 32° 22½′, and longitude 127° 2′; the coast, four miles distant to the northward, was low and sandy, but rose quickly to the level bank, upon which there were some shrubs and small trees. Nothing of the interior country could be seen above the bank; but this might possibly have been owing to the haze, which was so thick that no extremes of the land could be defined. The wind was fresh at south-south-west, and by seven in the evening our longitude was augmented 55′; the land was then distant six or seven miles, trending east-north-eastward; and we hauled to the wind which had increased in strength though the barometer was fast rising.

Having stood to the south-east till midnight, we then tacked to the westward; and at five next morning bore away north for the land, the wind being then at south-by-east, and the barometer announcing by its elevation a return of foul winds. At six we steered eastward, along the same kind of shore as seen on the preceding day; but the wind coming more unfavourable, and depth diminishing to 5 fathoms soon after eight o'clock, made it necessary to stretch off to sea. The coast, in latitude 32° 1′ and longitude 128° 12′, was three miles distant to the north. A league further on it took a more northern direction, but without much changing its aspect; it continued to be the same sandy beach, with a bank behind it of level land topped with small trees and shrubs as before described.

The rest of the day and the whole of the 25th were taken up in beating fruitlessly against an eastern wind. Azimuths observed when the ship's head was east-by-north, gave variation 6° 4′; and ten miles to the south a little eastward, they gave 3° 8′ west, at south-by-east; corrected 3° 2′ and 2° 32′, and the mean 2° 47′ for the true variation, showing a decrease since the last, of 1° 19′ for 2° 11′ of longitude.

At ten in the evening, our situation was less advanced than on the morning of the 24th, when we tacked off shore; but the mercury was again descending, and during the night the wind veered to north-east, to north, and at eight in the morning to west