fenfible of its benefits. We had this day the thermometer
at 48° which, confidering the neighbourhood of the huge
heaps of fnow on fhore, was very moderate. This part of the
world has been called the Coalt of Defolatiori by the navigators
who firft vifited it, and feems fully to deferve . the
appellation. Here we difcerned nothing but vaft mountains,
of which the fpiry fummits were every where covered
with eternal fnow. Along the fea, the neareft rocks
were clear of fnow, but black, and deftitute of gralTes or
fhrubbery. Some inlets appeared in different parts, where
a few iflands feemed to have a covering of green. We
Rood in to one of thefe in the evening, having then obtained
an eafterly breeze. A huge perpendicular wall of
rock formed its weftern entrance, and captain Coo^ called
it the York Minfler, having difeovered a ftrong refemblanee
between that Gothic building, and this dreary chaotic rock.
It lies in SS° 3 °* S. and 70° 28 W. Along the coaft we
found regular foundings, but in the mouth of the inlet,
we could not reach the bottom with one hundred and fifty
fathom of line. This circumftanee had already happened
to us before at Dufky Bay (vol. I. p. 123); but as we faw
a very fpacious found before us, we ventured to ftand on,
amidft different rude iflands, on which the fummits of
hills were fometimes capt with fnow. A boat was hoifted
out, in which my father accompanied fome of the lieutenants,
who endeavoured to fhoot birds, but brought only
one
one on board. After being much retarded by calms, we
arrived about nine o’clock in a fmall covej indifferently
fheltered either from wind or fea, but a welcome place of
refuge on account of the approach of night. Here, then
we dropped the anchor, which had been aweigh only forty-
one days, during which we had croffed the South Sea iu
its full extent, from New Zeeland to Cape Defeado.
The next morning captain Cook, accompanied by feveral
officers, as well as my father, Dr. Sparrman-, and nayfelf,
went in a boat in quell of a more fafe and convenient
anchorage. We only rowed round a Angle point of the
ifland under which our fhip lay, and immediately found a
fine cove fheltered from all wind's, and perfectly land locked,
with a little rill of water, and a fhrubbery. The weather
was mild confidering the climate, and feveral birds were-
heard on the fhore. We found many little clefts, which
cannot properly be called vallies, where a few fhrubs of
different fpecies, fprung up in a thin layer of fwampy foil,
being defended again!! the violence of ftorms, and expofed
to the genial influence of reverberated fun-beams. The
rock of which the whole ifland confifted, is a coarfe granite,,
compofed of feld-fpath, quartz, and black mica or glimmer.
This rock is. in mod places entirely naked, without the
fmalleft vegetable particle; but wherever the rains, or melted’
fnows have wafhed together fome little rubbifh, and other
particles in decay, it is covered with a coating of minuteplants,
»774- D e c em b e r ,
Wednefd. zr,