Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/275

] might have been managed with facility, under the shelter of the reefs, where the sea is extremely tranquil.

About seven o'clock in the morning, we came in sight of many mountainous islands and detached rocks, stretching from N.N.E. to E.N.E. and which render this extremity of New Caledonia still more dangerous than the southern part. Some of those islands are several hundred toises in extent. The points of a great number of black rocks were elevated above the water. Those rocks, surrounded by water slightly agitated, seemed themselves to be in motion, and, at first sight, we took them for canoes, floating on the surface. We soon discovered that those little islands were numerous; for they extended as far as we could see from the mast head. They are encircled with reefs, amidst which the sea assumes the colour of the reddish sand which composes its bottom. We had a near view of them; for, about eleven o'clock, we were but about 1,500 toises to the southward of one of those little islands, when we observed reefs extending from its western point, in the direction of W.N.W. as far as the eye could reach.

At the place, where we found our latitude at noon to be 20° 6′ 4″ south, our longitude being 161°