Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/463

] in his hammock. The preceding evening he had partaken of a feast, which the gunners formerly used to celebrate with exactness. They had long been saving a considerable part of their provisions for this entertainment. The unfortunate son of Vulcan, extenuated, like the rest of us, by the abstinence to which we had been condemned since our departure from Amboyna, had too much indulged his appetite, and we were deprived of him by a stroke of the apoplexy. This loss would have been irreparable, if good fortune had not conducted on board of our ship, at the Cape of Good Hope, the very intelligent workman who succeeded him.

At noon, being in latitude 34° 45′ 36″ south, and longitude 113° 38′ 56″, the nearest part of the coast bore N.E. distant 5,100 toises; and the land we saw, set from W. 15° S. to E. 40° 30′ S.

The mountains now began to assume the appearance of a regular chain, the highest of which did not seem to exceed 200 toises in perpendicular elevation. We observed large tracts of them entirely denuded of vegetation: in other places, feeble shrubs were sparingly scattered, with here and there a tree of moderate height.

The mountains sometimes presented several chains, rising by degrees above each other. At