Page:A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 1.djvu/331

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Between the Archipelagos.]
TERRA AUSTRALIS.
105

1802.
January.
Friday 29.

of a hill two or three miles off. Two teal were shot on the beach, whence it seemed probable that some lake or pond of fresh water was not far distant; a sea pie and a gull were also shot, and a few small fish caught along-side. These constituted every thing like refreshment obtained here, and the botanists found the scantiness of plants equal to that of the other productions; so that there was no inducement to remain longer.

Fowler's Bay, however, may be useful to a ship in want of a place of shelter. It is open only to the three points of the compass between south-east-by-south and east-south-east; and it was evident from plants growing close to the water side, that a swell capable of injuring a vessel at anchor was seldom, if ever thrown into it.

The latitude of the east extremity of Point Fowler is
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 32°  1′ south
Longitude of the point, deduced from twenty-two sets of distances (see Table III of the Appendix to this volume) is 132° 30′; but that given by time keepers with accelerated rates and supplemental correction, as explained at the end of Chap. VI, and in the Appendix, is preferred, and is
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132 27 east
The variation observed upon the binnacle, with the ship's head east-south-east, was 3° 11′ west by the surveying compass; and in the offing, with the head north-north-east, it was 1° 41′ west. These, corrected, will be 0° 19′ and 0° 30′; and therefore the variation allowed upon the bearings on shore was
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  0 25 west.
The wind was at south-east-by-south at one in the afternoon, when the anchor was weighed to beat out of the bay. At half past five we were three miles from a cliffy head which had been taken for an island at the anchorage, and set at N. 77 E. The shore forms a small bight on the east side of this head, and then stretches south-