Page:A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2.djvu/349

1803.
October.

part of the day was frequently required at them to keep her free, and they were becoming worse from such constant use.

Sunday 16.Our north-west course was resumed at five in the morning, and continued without interruption, or sight of any danger, to the 19th at noon,Wednes. 19. when the latitude was 10° 53′ south, and longitude by time keeper 147° 6′ east; the current had set above ¾ of a mile an hour to the N. 60° W., and we had every day seen boobies, noddies, tropic birds, and some gulls. At four in the afternoon the course was altered one point more west, in order to make the Eastern Fields(Atlas,
Plate XIII.) whose extent to the southward, not having been seen in the Investigator, I wished now to ascertain. The breakers came in sight at eight next morning,Thursday 20. and we hauled up to pass round their south end; but the wind being scant for going to windward of all, and the small gap before seen in the middle appearing to be passable for the Cumberland, we bore up for it. The depth at less than a quarter of a mile off was 40 fathoms, then 6, 7, 4 in the centre of the opening, 8, and no ground with the hand line; this front reef seeming to be a mere ledge of coral, which extended N.N.E. and S.S.W.; and that part of the opening in it where the sea did not break, is about one mile wide. Immediately on getting through, altitudes were taken for the time keeper; and the longitude, reduced to the north-east extremity of the Eastern Fields, was 145° 44½′ east, or about 1′ less than what had been found in the investigator from Broad Sound.

In steering W.N.W., two small patches of reef were left to the south and one to the north, about five miles from the opening; other reefs then came in sight a-head and on each bow; and after sounding in 34 fathoms coral sand, and observing the latitude 10° 2⅓′, we passed through a narrow channel between them, having no ground at 7 fathoms. At one o'clock, the western extremity of these reefs bore S. 16° E. two miles, and others were seen in the horizon extending from N.W. to W.S.W.; we passed close round the north end of these; but the single breaker laid down the year before, and which should lie about five miles to the N.N.E., was not