A Voyage to Terra Australis by Matthew Flinders

Author:Matthew Flinders [Flinders, Matthew]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Australia & New Zealand, Travel, General
ISBN: 9781108018180
Google: nbEKOOiocmEC
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2010-08-26T22:11:54+00:00

Having found one communication, we rowed up the western branch near the reddish cliffs, hoping to get back to Keppel Bay by a second new passage; but after going two miles, with a diminishing depth from 4 fathoms to three feet, we were stopped by mangroves, and obliged to return to the main stream.

The tide was half ebbed when we came to the shallowest part of the communicating channel; and it was with much difficulty that the boat could be got over. A space here of about two miles in length, appears to be dry, or very nearly so, at low water; but it is possible that some small channel may exist amongst the mangroves, of sufficient depth for a boat to pass at all times of tide.

We reached the entrance of the eastern arm from Keppel Bay, with the last of the ebb; and took the flood to go up the southern branch. The depth of water was generally 3 fathoms, on the eastern side, and the width nearly half a mile. This continued three miles up, when a division took place; in the smallest, which ran southward, we got one mile, and up the other, leading south-westward, two miles; when both were found to terminate in shallows amongst the mangroves. It was then dusk; and there being no possibility of landing, the boat was made fast to a mangrove bush till high water, and with the returning ebb, we got on board the ship at eleven o'clock.

The Lady Nelson had returned from the hummocky island, without taking any turtle. No good anchorage was found, nor was there either wood or water upon the island, worth the attention of a ship. Mr. Murray ascended the highest of the hummocks with a compass, but did not see any lands in the offing further out than the Keppel Isles.

SATURDAY 14 AUGUST 1802

I left the ship again in the morning, and went up the southern arm to a little hill on its western shore; hoping to gain from thence a better knowledge of the various streams which intersect the low land on the south side of the bay. This arm is one mile in width, and the depth in it from 3 to 6 fathoms; the shores are flat, as in other parts, and covered with mangroves; but at high water a landing was effected under the South Hill, without much trouble. The sides of this little eminence are steep, and were so thickly covered with trees and shrubs, bound together and intertwisted with strong vines, that our attempts to reach the top were fruitless. It would perhaps have been easier to climb up the trees, and scramble from one to another upon the vines, than to have penetrated through the intricate net work in the darkness underneath.

Disappointed in my principal object, and unable to do any thing in the boat, which could not then approach the shore within two hundred yards, I sought to walk upwards, and ascertain the communication between

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