A

day out of sight of land, to our no small satisfaction. reef such as we have just passed is a thing scarcely known in Europe, or indeed anywhere but in these seas. It is a wall of coral rock, rising almost perpendicularly out of the unfathomable ocean, always covered at high-water, commonly by seven or eight feet, and generally bare at low-water. The large waves of the vast ocean meeting with so sudden a resistance make here a most terrible surf, breaking mountains high, especially when, as in our case, the general tradewind blows directly upon it.

16th. At three o'clock this morning it dropped calm, which did not better our situation, for we were not more than four or five leagues from the reef, towards which the swell drove us. By six o'clock we were within a cable length of the reef, so fast had we been driven on it, without our being able to find ground with 100 fathoms. The boats were got out, to try if they could tow the ship off, but we were within forty yards when a light air sprang up, and moved the ship off a little. The boats being now manned tried to tow her away, but, whenever the air dropped, they only succeeded in keeping the ship stationary. We now found what had been the real cause of our escape, namely, the turn of the tide. It was the flood that had hurried us so unaccountably fast to the reef, which we had almost reached just at high-water. The ebb, however, aided by the boats' crews, only carried us about two miles from the reef, when the tide turned again, so that we were in no better situation. No wind would have been of any use, for we were so embayed by the reef that with the general tradewind it would have been impossible to get out. Fortunately a narrow opening in the reef was observed, and a boat sent to examine it reporting that it was practicable-the other boats meanwhile struggling against the flood-the ship's head was turned towards it, and we were carried through by a stream like a mill-race. By four o'clock we came to an anchor, happy once more to encounter those shoals which but two days before we had thought ourselves supremely happy to have escaped from.

AUG. 1770

TORRES STRAITS

29

As we were now safe at an anchor, the boats were sent upon the nearest shoal to search for shell-fish, turtle, or whatever else they could get; Dr. Solander and I accompanied them in my small boat. On our way we met with two watersnakes, one five and the other six feet long: we took them both. They much resembled land snakes, only their tails were flattened sideways, I suppose, for the convenience of swimming, and they were not venomous. The shoal we went upon was the very reef we had so nearly been lost upon yesterday, now no longer terrible to us. It afforded little provision for the ship, no turtle, only 300 lbs. of great cockles; some of an immense size. We had in the way of curiosity much better success, meeting with many curious fish and mollusca, besides corals of many species, all alive, among which was the Tubipora musica. I have often lamented that we had not time to make proper observations upon this curious tribe of animals; but we were so entirely taken up with the more conspicuous links of the chain of creation, as fish, plants, birds, etc. etc., that it was impossible.

21st. We observed both last night and this morning that the main looked very narrow, so we began to look out for the passage we expected to find between New Holland and New Guinea. At noon one was seen, very narrow but appearing to widen; we resolved to try it, so stood in. The anchor was dropped, and we went ashore2 to examine whether the place we stood into was a bay or a passage; for as we sailed right before the trade-wind, we might find difficulty in getting out, should it prove to be the former. The hill gave us the satisfaction of seeing a strait, at least as far as we could see, without any obstructions: in the evening a strong tide made us almost certain.3

26th. Fine weather and clear fresh trade: stood to the W. and deepened our water from 13 to 27 fathoms.

1 York Peninsula.

2 On Possession Island.

3 Banks does not allude to Cook having here hoisted English colours and taken possession of the whole east coast of Australia from 38° S. to Cape York in the name of the king, as he had of several other places along the coast (Wharton's Cook, p. 312). Neither Cook nor Banks was aware that Torres had sailed through these straits in 1606 (see p. li.)

CHAPTER XIII

SOME ACCOUNT OF THAT PART OF NEW HOLLAND NOW CALLED NEW SOUTH WALES1 1

General appearance of the coast-Dampier's narrative-Barrenness of the country-Scarcity of water-Vegetables and fruits-Timber-PalmsGum trees-Quadrupeds—Birds—Insects-Ants and their habitations— Fish-Turtle-Shell-fish-Scarcity of people-Absence of cultivationDescription of natives-Ornaments-Absence of vermin-Implements for catching fish-Food-Cooking-Habitations - Furniture - Vessels for carrying water-Bags-Tools-Absence of sharp instruments-Native method of procuring fire-Weapons-Throwing-sticks-Shield-Cowardice of the people-Canoes-Climate-Language.

HAVING now, I believe, fairly passed through between New Holland and New Guinea, and having an open sea to the westward, so that to-morrow we intend to steer more to the northwards in order to make the south coast of New Guinea, it seems high time to take leave of New Holland, which I shall do by summing up the few observations I have been able to make on the country and people. I much wished, indeed, to have had better opportunities of seeing and observing the people, as they differ so much from the account that Dampier (the only man I know of who has seen them besides us) has given of them: he indeed saw them on a part of the coast very distant from where we were, and consequently the people might be different; but I should rather conclude them to be the same, chiefly from having observed an universal conformity in such of their

1 This chapter is thus entitled by Banks. The name "New Wales" was bestowed by Cook on the whole eastern coast from lat. 38 S. to Cape York: the Admiralty copy of Cook's Journal, and that belonging to Her Majesty, call it "New South Wales" (Wharton's Cook, p. 312).

1

1770

DAMPIER'S VOYAGE TO NEW HOLLAND

customs as

297

came under my observation in the several places we landed upon during the run along the coast. Dampier in general seems to be a faithful relater; but in the voyage in which he touched on the coast of New Holland he was in a ship of pirates; possibly himself not a little tainted by their idle examples, he might have kept no written journal of anything more than the navigation of the ship, and when upon coming home he was solicited to publish an account of his voyage, may have referred to his memory for many particulars relating to the people, etc. These Indians, when covered with their filth, which I believe they never wash off, are, if not coal black, very near it. As negroes, then, he might well esteem them, and add the woolly hair and want of two front teeth in consequence of the similitude in complexion between these and the natives of Africa; but from whatever cause it might arise, certain it is that Dampier either was very much mistaken in his account, or else saw a very different race of people from those we have seen.

In the whole length of coast which we sailed along, there was a very unusual sameness to be observed in the face of the country. Barren it may justly be called, and in a very high degree, so far at least as we saw. The soil in general is sandy and very light; on it grow grass, tall enough but thin set, and trees of a tolerable size; never, however, near together, being in general 40, 50, and 60 feet apart. This, and spots of loose sand, sometimes very large, constitute the general face of the country as you sail along it, and indeed the greater part even after penetrating inland as far as our situation would allow us to do. The banks of

the bays were generally clothed with thick mangroves, sometimes for a mile or more in breadth. The soil under these is rank mud, always overflowed every spring tide. Inland you sometimes meet with a bog upon which the grass grows rank and thick, so that no doubt the soil is sufficiently fertile. The valleys also between the hills, where runs of water come down, are thickly clothed with underwood; but they are generally very steep and narrow, so that upon the

whole the fertile soil bears no kind of proportion to that which seems by nature doomed to everlasting barrenness.

Water is a scarce article, or at least was so while we were there, which I believe to have been in the very height of the dry season. At some places we were in we saw not a drop, and at the two places where we filled for the ship's use it was done from pools, not brooks. This drought is probably owing to the dryness of a soil almost entirely composed of sand, in which high hills are scarce. That there is plenty, however, in the rainy season is sufficiently evinced by the channels we saw cut even in rocks down the sides of inconsiderable hills: these were in general dry, or if any of them contained water, it was such as ran in the woody valleys, and they seldom carried water above half-way down the hill. Some, indeed, we saw that formed brooks, and ran quite down to the sea; but these were scarce and in general brackish a good way up from the beach.

A soil so barren, and at the same time entirely void of the help derived from cultivation, could not be supposed to yield much to the support of man. We had been so long at sea with but a scanty supply of fresh provisions, that we had long been used to eat everything we could lay our hands upon, fish, flesh, and vegetables, if only they were not poisonous. Yet we could only now and then procure a dish of bad greens for our own table, and never, except in the place where the ship was careened, did we meet with a sufficient quantity to supply the ship. There, indeed, palm cabbage, and what is called in the West Indies Indian kale, were in tolerable plenty; as also was a sort of purslane. The other plants which we ate were a kind of bean (very bad), a kind of parsley, and a plant something resembling spinach, which two last grew only to the southward. shall give their botanical names, as I believe some of them were never eaten by Europeans before: Indian kale (Arum esculentum), red-flowered purslane (Sesuvium portulacastrum), beans (Glycine speciosa), parsley (Apium), spinach (Tetragonia cornuta).

I