A wet dock might be made of the basin without other trouble or expense than a little deepening of the narrow entrance, and throwing a pair of gates across; and were the mud to be cleared out, the basin would contain fifteen or twenty sail of merchant ships with great ease. The flood _tide_ came from the north and the ebb from the south, past the anchorage; but on the outside, they run south-west and north-east. It is not extraordinary that the rise and fall by the shore did not exactly coincide with the swinging of the ship; but that the time of high water should differ three hours, and the rise twenty feet from Broad Sound, is remarkable. According to Mr. Fowler's observations in the basin, it was high water there _eight hours after_ the moon's passage; and the rise at the neaps and springs appeared to be from eight to twelve feet. Three meridian observations to the north, taken by lieutenant Flinders, gave the _latitude_ of our anchorage, 21° 39' 31" S. _Longitude_, according to the position of Upper Head and the survey from thence, 150° 12' E. _Variation_ of the needle, observed on the low south-west point of No. 2, 8° 28' E. Three compasses on board the ship at anchor, gave 5° 34' when the head was east, or corrected to the meridian, 8° 4' E. Upon the different elevated places whence bearings were taken, the variation differed from 7° 30' to 9° 30' east. MONDAY 4 OCTOBER 1802 Early in the morning of the 4th, we got under way, with the Lady Nelson in company, to proceed on our voyage to Torres' Strait and the Gulph of Carpentaria. The wind was at E. by N., and we kept close up to weather the northern Percy Isles; for I had a desire to fall in with the reefs laid down by Mr. Campbell, three-quarters of a degree to the eastward, in latitude 21½°; and to ascertain their termination to the north-westward. [EAST COAST. BARRIER REEFS.] The tide prevented us from weathering the islands till three in the afternoon; we then passed between No. 4 and some rocks lying two miles to the north-east, with 33 fathoms water. During the night we tacked every two hours, working to the eastward, in from 30 to 36 fathoms; and at daylight [TUESDAY 5 OCTOBER 1802], my station on the eastern isle No. 4 bore N. 89° W., four leagues. Nothing was seen in the offing, but in stretching to the N. N. E, reefs were discovered from the mast head a little before noon; and after the observation for the latitude was taken, I set one bearing East to E. by S., two leagues, and another N. 14° W. to 29° E., four or five miles. Our situation was in 21° 15 2/3' south, and longitude from the bearing of the Pine Peak, 150° 34' east.