I Was Very Sorry At Their
Having Left Us, As The Cloudy Sky Had Prevented Me For Several Days From
Taking Any Latitude, And Determining My Position.
We crossed a great
number of small creeks, coming from the eastward, and draining the ridges
of the neck of the Peninsula.
Scattered Pandanus and drooping tea-trees
grew on their banks as far as the fresh water extended; when they were
succeeded by the salt-water tea-tree and the mangrove, covering and
fringing their beds, which enlarged into stiff plains, without
vegetation, or into mangrove swamps. The latter were composed of
Aegiceras, Bruguiera, and Pemphis. The tracks of the buffaloes increased
in number as we advanced, and formed broad paths, leading in various
directions, and made me frequently mistake them for the foot-path of the
natives, which I eventually lost. A course north 30 degrees west, brought
us to easterly creeks, one of which I followed down, when Brown called
out that he saw the sea. We, therefore, went to the sea-side, and found
ourselves at the head of a large bay, with an island to the north-east,
and with headlands stretching far into the ocean, which was open and
boundless to the northward. It was Mount Morris Bay, with Valentia and
Crocker's islands; the latter, however, appeared to us to be a
continuation of the main land. We now went to the north-west and
westward, until we came again on westerly waters. The country in the
centre of the neck of the Peninsula, was very hilly, and some of the
ridges rose, perhaps, from one hundred and fifty to two hundred feet
above the level of the sea; one or two hills were still higher.
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