Page:A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 1.djvu/330

 

CHAPTER V.

 

Fowler's Bay. Departure from thence. Arrival at the Isles of St. Francis. Correspondence between the winds and the marine barometer. Examination of the other parts of Nuyts' Archipelago, and of the main coast. The Isles of St. Peter. Return to St. Francis. General remarks on Nuyts' Archipelago. Identification of the islands in the Dutch chart.

 

1802.
January.
Thurs. 28.
(Atlas,
Plate IV.)The bay in which we anchored on the evening of January 28, at the extremity of the before known south coast of Terra Australis, was named Fowler's Bay, after my first lieutenant; and the low, cliffy point which shelters it from southern winds and, not improbably, is the furthest point (marked B) in the Dutch chart, was called Point Fowler. The botanical gentlemen landed early on the following morning Friday 29.to examine the productions of the country, and I went on shore to take observations and bearings, and to search for fresh water.

The cliffs and rocks of Point Fowler are calcareous, and connected with the main land by a low, sandy isthmus of half a mile broad. Many traces of inhabitants were found, and amongst others, some decayed spears; but no huts were seen, nor any thing to indicate that men had been here lately. Upon the beach were the foot marks of dogs, and some of the emu or cassowary. I found in a hole of the low cliffs one of those large nests which have before been mentioned, but it contained nothing, and had been long abandoned.

No fresh water was discovered round the shores of the bay, nor was there any wood large enough for fuel, nearer than the brow