A Voyage to Terra Australis — Volume 2: Undertaken for the purpose of completing the discovery of that vast country, and prosecuted in the years 1801, 1802 and 1803, in His Majesty's ship the Investigator, and subsequently in the armed vessel Porpoise and Cumberland schoonerFlinders, Matthew
History
A Voyage to Terra Australis — Volume 2: Undertaken for the purpose of completing the discovery of that vast country, and prosecuted in the years 1801, 1802 and 1803, in His Majesty's ship the Investigator, and subsequently in the armed vessel Porpoise and Cumberland schooner
Flinders, Matthew
Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Voyages and travels
The shoal which stopped our progress did not run off from Shoal Cape, as
captain Bligh had supposed, but from a smaller and nearer island, two
miles from my station. Within the large island, of which Shoal Cape forms
the north-western point, I saw water like an inclosed port, probably the
Wolf's Bay of captain Edwards; and it seemed possible that the land may
be there divided; but the best information I can give of the forms and
extent of all these islands, will be seen in the particular chart.
It was now ascertained, that the figures resembling sentry boxes were ant
hills, of eight or more feet high; Pelsert found similar hills on the
West Coast, and says they might have been taken for the houses of
Indians, as in fact we did take them at a distant view. They were also
seen by Dampier on the North-west Coast, who mistook them in the same
way; but says he found them to be so many rocks, probably from not making
the examination with his usual care. The insects which inhabit, and I
suppose erect these structures, are small, reddish, with black heads, and
seemed to be a sluggish and feeble race. We found the common black flies
excessively numerous here; and almost as troublesome as Dampier describes
them to be on the North-west Coast.
Good's Island is between one and two miles long, and resembles the rest
of the cluster in being hilly, woody, and rocky, with small beaches on
the leeward side. The stone is granitic and brittle; but there is also
porphyry, and in one place I found streaks of verdegrease, as if the
cliffs above had contained copper ore. A log of wood, resembling the
cedar of Port Jackson, was thrown up on the beach, but none of the trees
were seen; those scattered over the island, though of various kinds, were
small and fit for little else than the fire. A species of silk-cotton
plant was plentiful; the fibres in the pod are strong, and have a fine
gloss, and might perhaps be advantageously employed in manufacture.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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