Volume II Part 21 (1/2)
The country between Cape Grenville and Cape York is low and sandy, with but few sinuosities in its coast line: it is exposed to the trade wind, which often blows with great strength, from South-East and South-East by East.
ESCAPE RIVER, in 10 degrees 57 1/2 minutes, is an opening in the land of one mile in breadth, trending in for two or three miles, when it turns to the north, and is concealed from the view; the land on the north side of the entrance is probably an island, for an opening was observed in Newcastle Bay, trending to the south, which may communicate with the river. The entrance is defended by a bar, on which the Mermaid was nearly lost. (Volume 1.) The deepest channel may probably be near the south head, which is rocky. The banks on the south side are wooded, and present an inviting aspect.
NEWCASTLE BAY is nine miles in extent by six deep; its sh.o.r.es are low, and apparently of a sandy character; at the bottom there is a considerable opening bearing West 1/4 North eight miles and a half from Turtle Island.
Off the south head of the bay is TURTLE ISLAND, a small rocky islet on the east side of an extensive reef, in lat.i.tude 10 degrees 54 minutes, and longitude 142 degrees 38 minutes 40 seconds; it is separated by a channel three miles wide from reef x, which has a dry sand at its north end, in lat.i.tude 10 degrees 53 minutes, and longitude 142 degrees 42 minutes, it has also some dry rocks and a mangrove bush on the inner part of its south end.
Four miles to the north of x are two shoals y and Z, both of which are covered; y is two miles and a half long, and three miles and a quarter; neither of them appeared to be a mile in width; the north-west end of z, when in a line with Mount Adolphus, bears North 19 degrees West.
Off the north head of Newcastle Bay, which forms the south-east trend of the land of Cape York, is a group of high rocky islands, ALBANY ISLES; and immediately off the point is a reef, which extends for about a mile; half a mile without its edge, we had ten fathoms.
The islets 12, 13, and 15, were only seen at a distance.
THE BROTHERS, so called in Lieutenant Bligh's chart, are two high rocks upon a reef.
ALBANY ISLES contain six islands, of which one only is of large size; the easternmost has a small peak, and a reef extends for less than a quarter of a mile from it; the peak is in lat.i.tude 10 degrees 43 minutes 45 seconds, and longitude 142 degrees 35 minutes 5 seconds.
YORK ISLES is a group about seven miles from the mainland; the princ.i.p.al island, which is not more than two miles long, has a very conspicuous flat-topped hill upon it, MOUNT ADOLPHUS,* in lat.i.tude 10 degrees 38 minutes 20 seconds, and longitude 142 degrees 36 minutes 25 seconds. Off the south-east end of this island are two rocky islets, the southernmost of which is more than a mile distant; the northern group of the York Isles are laid down from Captain Flinders.
(*Footnote. There is a bay on the west side or Mount Adolphus, but it appeared shoal. Roe ma.n.u.script.)
CAPE YORK, the northernmost land of New South Wales, has a conical hill half a mile within its extremity, the situation of which is in 10 degrees 42 minutes 40 seconds South, and 142 degrees 28 minutes 50 seconds East of Greenwich. There is also an island close to the point with a conical hill upon it, which has perhaps been hitherto taken for the cape; from which it is separated by a shoal strait half a mile wide; the lat.i.tude of the summit is 10 degrees 41 minutes 35 seconds, and longitude 142 degrees 28 minutes 25 seconds. From this island a considerable shoal extends to the westward for six miles towards a peaked hill on the extremity of a point. In the centre of this shoal are some dry rocks.
At the distance of nearly five miles from the above island is the rocky islet a, in lat.i.tude 10 degrees 36 minutes 50 seconds, and longitude 142 degrees 27 minutes 45 seconds; it is of small size, and surrounded by deep water; and, being easily seen from the strait between Cape York and the York Isles, serves to direct the course.
POSSESSION ISLES consist of nine or ten islets, of which 2 and 7 only are of large size, and neither of these are two miles long; they are also higher than the others. Number 1 is a small conical hill; 2 is hummocky; 3, 4, and 6, are very small; 5 makes with a hollow in its centre, like the seat of a saddle. The pa.s.sage between 2 and the small islets 3 and 4 is the best; there is six and seven fathoms water; but in pa.s.sing this, it must be recollected that the tide sets towards the islands on the northern side.
ENDEAVOUR STRAIT is on the south side of Prince of Wales' Islands: a shoal extends from Cape Cornwall (lat.i.tude 10 degrees 45 minutes 45 seconds, longitude 142 degrees 8 minutes 35 seconds) to the westward, and is probably connected with a strip of sand that stretches from Wallis'
Isles to Shoal Cape. We crossed it with the cape bearing about East, when the least depth was four fathoms; but on many parts there are not more than three fathoms. Variation 5 degrees 38 minutes West.
PRINCE OF WALES ISLANDS are much intersected by straits and openings, that are very little known; there was an appearance of a good port, a little to the South-West of HORNED HILL (lat.i.tude 10 degrees 36 minutes 35 seconds, longitude 142 degrees 15 minutes) which may probably communicate with Wolf's Bay; the strait to the south of Wednesday Island also offers a good port in the eastern entrance of some rocky islands and without them is the rock b, with some sunken dangers near it.
WEDNESDAY ISLAND; its north end, in lat.i.tude 10 degrees 30 minutes 10 seconds, and longitude 142 degrees 15 minutes, may be approached close, but a considerable shoal stretches off its western side, the greater part of which is dry.
Off HAMMOND'S ISLAND is a high, conspicuous rock, bearing West 3/4 South, and five miles and three-quarters from the north end of Wednesday Island.
Captain Flinders pa.s.sed through the strait separating Wednesday Island from Hammond's Islands, and had four, five, and six fathoms.
Abreast of the strait separating GOOD'S ISLAND from the latter is the reef c, on which are several dry rocks, but abreast of it, and one mile and one quarter from it, is the reef d,* which is generally covered; the latter bears South 75 degrees West three miles and a quarter from the rock off Hammond's Island, and about North 45 degrees West two and a quarter miles from the opening between Good and Hammond's Island; the marks for avoiding it are given in the sailing directions.
(*Footnote. d consists of three small detached patches, that extend farther off than is at first observed. There is also a narrow strip of rocks extending for a short distance off the north-east end of the reef off Hammond's Island. Roe ma.n.u.script.)
Abreast of Wednesday, Hammond, and Good's Islands, is the NORTH-WEST REEF, an extensive coral bank, many parts of which are dry; it is ten or eleven miles long; the channel between it and the islands is from one mile and three-quarters to two miles and a quarter wide.
b.o.o.bY ISLAND (lat.i.tude of its centre 10 degrees 36 minutes, longitude 141 degrees 52 minutes 50 seconds) is a small rocky islet of scarcely a third of a mile in diameter; its south-west end has a shoal projecting from it for half a mile, but its other sides are bold to. In a North 70 degrees East direction from it, at the distance of two miles and three-quarters, is a sandbank with three fathoms; it was discovered by the s.h.i.+ps Claudine and Mary, on their pa.s.sage through Torres Strait, when it was named LARPENT'S BANK.*
(*Footnote. It is near the west end of a shoal of five miles in length, extending in an east and west direction, a few feet only below the surface of the water. Roe ma.n.u.script.)