WOODEN PILLOW. NEW GUINEA CANOE IN A SQUALL. NATIVES OF REDSCAR BAY. PLAYHOUSE OF BOWER BIRD OF CAPE YORK. NEW ZOOPHYTES. C. Busk, delt. W. Wing, lith. T. & W. Boone, Publishers, London. 1852. Hullmandel & Walton, Lithographers. ... VOYAGE OF H.M.S. RATTLESNAKE. CHAPTER 1.1. Objects of the Voyage. Admiralty Instructions. Hydrographer's Instructions. Sail from Plymouth. Arrive at Madeira. Funchal. Visit to Curral. Try for Deep Sea Soundings. Crossing the Line. Arrive at Rio de Janeiro. City of Rio and Neighbourhood. Dredging in Botafogo Bay. Slavery. Religious Processions. Brazilian Character. Cross the South Atlantic. Temperature of the Sea. Oceanic Birds. Pelagic Animals. Arrive at Simon's Bay. Survey the Bay. Caffre War. Observations on the Waves. Arrive at Mauritius. Port Louis. Visit to Pamplemousses. La Pouce Mountain. Try for Deep Sea Soundings. Arrive at Hobart Town. H.M.S. Rattlesnake, one of the old class of 28-gun ships, was commissioned at Portsmouth on September 24th, 1846, by the late Captain Owen Stanley, with a complement of 180 officers and men. The nature and objects of the intended voyage will best be conveyed to the reader through the medium of the following instructions from the Admiralty, for the use of which I am indebted to Lieutenant C.B. Yule, who succeeded to the command of the Rattlesnake, upon the death of our late lamented Captain, at Sydney, in March 1850, after the successful accomplishment of the principal objects of the expedition. BY THE COMMISSIONERS FOR EXECUTING THE OFFICE OF LORD HIGH ADMIRAL OF THE UNITED KINGDOM OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND, ETC. Whereas, it being the usual practice of vessels returning from the Australian Colonies, or from the South Sea, to proceed to India through Torres Strait; and most of those vessels preferring the chance of finding a convenient opening in the Barrier Reefs to the labour of frequent anchorage in the Inshore Passage, it was thought fit to send out an expedition under Captain Francis Blackwood, to determine which was the best opening that those reefs would afford, and to make such a survey thereof as would ensure the safety of all vessels which should continue to adopt that mode of reaching the Strait: And whereas, although that specific object was successfully achieved by the survey of Raine Island Passage, and by the erection of a durable beacon there to render it the more accessible, yet it appears that much is still to be done in those seas in order to make the approach to the Strait more secure and certain, as well as to afford the choice of another entrance farther to the northward in case of vessels overshooting the latitude of Raine Island by stress of wind, or current: