Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/464

436 At four o'clock P.M. we saw some breakers near the coast, and a little to the eastward, two rocks 510 toises from the beach, and which we passed at a very small distance. The largest was remarkable for a separation in the middle, from which rose perpendicularly, about twenty-five toises above the level of the sea, an isolated piece, in the form of a very flat plate. I took it and its base, to be composed of a sort of hard grey stone. We admired the fine effect of the waves, which rising to the very summit of the rock, assumed a colour perfectly white, and descending again in foam, displayed that singular rock, as if it had just emerged from the bosom of the deep.

The coast then extended very regularly towards E.S.E. its little bights being terminated by points, the most prominent of which scarcely advanced 1,000 toises into the sea.

Being driven by an impetuous wind, we were not without apprehensions, on finding ourselves so near a coast which offered us not the least shelter; but we clawed off during the night, by steering S.S.W. A very rough sea from the W.N.W. made our ship labour prodigiously. Having been so long accustomed to navigate smooth seas, we had lost the habit of supporting such violent agitation: the wind blew in impe- tuous