Page:The journal of the Royal Geographic Society of London. Volume 34, 1864. (IA s572id13663720).pdf/313

Rh beach, which extends for 3 miles, we found a strong current against us, which quite confirmed this opinion. Still, however, when close in shore, we could see no appearance of an entrance, the surf seeming to break with increased violence where the sandy beach meets the rocks. Proceeding cautiously, and keeping a few boats' lengths from the rocks, we however found that this appearance was deceptive, and that there was really a pretty-wide channel lying between the rocks and the point of the sandspit; and pulling up against a current of two or three knots, a few hundred yards brought us into comparatively still water, when we found that we were in a large river about a quarter of a mile in width, the first reach of which extends for nearly 2 miles parallel with the seashore, and separated from it only by a narrow sandspit. After landing on a gravelly point, where there was an old Maori hut and a camping-place where tents had been pitched very recently, I lost no time in examining and making a rough plan of the entrance of the river; and having sounded carefully, set up guidemarks by which to bring in the schooner at once with next morning's tide should she arrive in the offing during the night. The channel is quite deep enough for much larger vessels, as there is 10 feet of water in the shallowest part of the bar; but it is very narrow, and there are five or six awkward sunken rocks on that side on to which the current would naturally tend to sweep a vessel. However, I anticipated no difficulty in getting the yacht in if we could only hit the proper time of the tide. Next morning, as we could see nothing of her in the offing, we pulled up the river against the ebb for a few miles, and were greatly pleased with the alluvial land, and the fine quality of the forest growth with which it is covered. Being afraid that the schooner might arrive in time for the evening tide, I did not go far up the river; and on returning to the sandspit at 1, we saw her at a distance of 8 miles to the south-west, but further from the land than where we had left her on the previous day. After lighting a large fire as a signal, it being then low tide, I was able to improve my plan of the entrance to the river, and fill in the rocks and channel more accurately than previously. The current was flowing out with great velocity, the clear channel at the turn of the tide being contracted to a width of 110 feet.

Next morning (the 27th August) there was a fine southerly breeze, and w' were on the look-out for the schooner, but she was not in sight. However, at 8 we heard her gun fire round the point to the north, and immediately put out across the bar, it being then almost the turn of high-water. When they picked us up, after a pull of a couple of miles from the land, I learnt that the skipper, misled by the chart, had been sweeping the northmost bay all the morning in search of the entrance of the Awarua River, where he