Amſterdam and St. Paul. Though this courſe was the ſhorteſt, with reſpect to diſtance, that we could have taken in order to arrive at the channel through which we intended to ſail, the want of wind detained us much longer than might have been the caſe had we ſteered in another direction. By ſailing more directly ſouthward, we ſhould ſoon have met with winds that would have carried us in a ſhort time to the Cape of Van Diemen.
It was not before the 28th of March, when we were in lat. 37½° S. that the N.N.W. wind began to blow pretty freſh. A great flight of gulls and mews ſhowed us that we were near land; as theſe birds never fly to any great diſtance from the ſhore. We at length came in ſight of it about half after one in the afternoon. It was the iſland of St. Paul, which bore S.E. at the diſtance of about 20,000 toiſes. This iſland was diſcovered in 1696 by Captain Valming, and called by him the Iſle of Amſterdam, whilſt he gave the name of the Iſle of St. Paul to the moſt ſouthern of the two. Captain Cook, whom I have herein followed, reverſed theſe appellations, and gave the name of Iſle of Amſterdam to the ſouthernmoſt, and that of Iſle of St. Paul to the other.
The Iſle of St. Paul preſented itſelf, at a diſ-
tance,
