DAMPIER’s ACCOUNT OF NEW HOLLAND. 467

fearch before I left the bay : fo on the 11 th, about noon, I fleered farther in, with aneafy fail, becaufe we had but fhallow water ; we kept therefore good looking out forfear of fhoals, fometimes fhortening, fometimes deepening the water. About two inthe afternoon we faw the land a-head that makes the fouth of the bay, and beforenight we had again (holdings from that fhore, and therefore fhortened fail and flood offand on all night, under two topfails, continually founding, having never more thanten fathom, and feldom lefs than feven, The water deepened and fholdned fo verygently, that in heaving the lead five or fix times we fhould fcarce have a foot difference.When we came into feven fathom either way, we prefently went about. From thisfouth part of the bay we could not fee the land from whence we came in the afternoon;and this land we found to be an ifland of three or four leagues long, but it appearingbarren, I did not flrive to go nearer it, and the rather becaufe the winds would not permitus to do it without much trouble, and at the openings the water was generally fhoal:

I therefore made no farther attempts in this fouth-wefl and fouth part of the bay, butfleered away to the eaftward, to fee if there was any land that way, for as yet we hadfeen none there. On the 12th, in the morning, we paffed by the north point of thatland, and were confirmed in the perfuafion of its being an ifland, by feeing an openingto the eafl of it, as we had done on the weft. Having fair weather, a fmall gale andfmooth water, we flood further on in the bay, to fee what land was on the eafl of it.Our foundings at firft were feven fathom, which held fo a great while, but at lengthit decreafed to fix. Then we faw the land right a-head. We could not come near itwith the {hip, having but fhoal water, and it being dangerous lying there, and the landextraordinary low, very unlikely to have frefh water (though it had a few trees on it,feemingly mangroves), and much of it probably covered at highwater, I flood outagain that afternoon, deepening the water, and before night anchored in eight fathom,clean white fand, about the middle of the bay. The next day we got up our anchor,and that afternoon came to an anchor once more near two iflands and a fhoal of coralrocks that face the bay. Here I fcrubbed my fhip ; and finding it very improbable Ifhould get any further here, I made the beft of my way out to fea again, founding allthe way, but finding, by the fhallownefs of the water, that there was no going out tofea to the eafl of the two iflands that face the bay, nor between them, I returned tothe weft entrance, going out by the fame way I came in at, only on the eafl inftead ofthe weft fide of the fmall fhoal: in which channel we had ten, twelve, and thirteenfathom water, flill deepening upon us till we were out at fea. The day before we cameout I fent a boat a-fhore to the moft northerly of the two iflands, which is the lead ofthem, catching many fmall fifh in the mean while with hook and line : the boat’s crewreturning, told me that the ifle produces nothing but a fort of green, fhort, hard pricklygrafs, affording neither wood nor frefh water, and that a fea broke between the twodlands, a fign that the water was fhallow. They faw a large turtle, and many fkatessnd thombacks, but caught none.

It was Auguft the 14th when I failed out of this bay or found, the mouth of whichlies, as I faid, in 25 0 5', defigning to coaft along to the north-eafl till I might commo-dioufly put in at fome other port of New Holland. In pafling out we faw three water-f'erpents fwimming about in the fea, of a yellow colour, fpotted w'ith dark brown fpots ;they were each about four foot long, and about the bignefs of a man’s wrift, and werethe firft I faw on this coaft, which abounds with feveral forts of them ; we had the"finds at our firft coming out at north, and the land lying north-eafterly ; we plied°ft and on, getting forward but little till the next day, when the wind coming at fouth-fouth-wefl and fouth, we began to coaft it along the fhore on the northward, keeping

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