There were a few ducks, teal, herons, cranes, and a bird named
from its bill the Red-bill, upon the lagoons, with fome fmall flights
o f curlew and plover o f a beautiful feather.
The rocks confift of hardened clay, in which are mixed great
numbers o f fmall ftones, varioufly tiBged, fome with red, others
with yellow. Small portions of calcareous fpar lie fcattered about
upon the furface o f the rocky ground ; ftrata o f which are depo-
fited irregularly in fiflfures formed in the body o f the rocks them-
felves.
Leaving Twofold Bay upon a favourable.Ihift o f wind, the floop
proceeded to the fouthward, and on the 17th made a fmall duller
o f iflands, in latitude 38° 16 ', which now bears the name o f Kent’s
Group (a compliment to the commander o f his Majefty’s Ihip Supply).
Thefe are fix or feven in number, and o f various fizes. Their
height is very confiderable, and as irregular in figure as can well1 be
imagined in land whofe hummocks are no one o f them more lofty
than another. This fmall group appears to be formed o f granite,
•which is imperfectly concealed by long draggling dwarfilh brufh,
and fome few Hill more diminutive trees, and feems curled with a
fterility that might fafely bid defiance to Chinefe induftry itfelf.
Nature is either working very flowly with thofe iflands, or has altogether
ceafed to work upon them, fince a more wild deferted
place is not eafily to be met with. Even the birds feemed not to
Frequent them in their ufual numbers. There was, in Ihort, nothing
that could tempt our explorers to land.
Having palled Kent’s Group Handing to the fouthward, the next
morning Furneaux’s glands were in fight, and on thé following day
they anchored at Prefervation-Ifland, which is one o f them. Thefe
iflands, from what wasfeen o f them during' this run along, their
Ihore, and what had been feen. o f them before by Mr. Bafs, appear
to confift o f two kinds, perfectly diffimilar in figure, and moll probably
o f very unequal ages, but alike in the materials o f which
they are formed. Both kinds are o f granite ; but the one is low,
and
and rather level, with a foil o f fand covered with low brulh and
tufted grafs : the other is remarkably high, bold, and rocky, and
cut into a variety of Lingular peaks and knobs. Some little vegetable
foil lies upon thefe, and the vegetation is large; trees even of
a tolerable fize are produced in fome places. There are attached to
fome parts of thefe high iflands flips o f low fandy land, o f a firni-
lar height with the lower iflands, and probably coeval with them.
Prefervation-Ifland, which takes its refpeCtable name from having
preferved the crew o f the ihip Sydney-cove, arranges itfelf in
the humble clafs o f iflands, and is of a very moderate height. A
furface o f fand, varying in depth, and mixed in different fcanty
proportions with vegetable foil, fcarcely hides* from view the bafe,
which is o f granite. In feveral places vaft blocks o f this ftone lie
fcattered about, as free from vegetation and the injuries o f weather
as if they had fallen but yefterday : and, what is remarkable,
moft o f them, probably all, are evidently detached from the ftone
upon which they reft, fo entirely that they might be dragged from
the places where they lie, i f it were thought worth while to apply
a power fufficient to produce fo ufelefs an effeCt. It Ihould feem
then that thefe loofe blocks have fallen from fome place higher
than that upon which they were found; but that is impoflible, for
they are higher than any other part o f the ifland. And the fuppofi-
tion that the injuries o f the air and the rain eaufed the removal o f
that pari o f the granite which might originally have been of a cor-
refponding height with thefe remaining blocks, feems hardly ad-
miffible in the prefent inftance. Perhaps fubterraneous or volcanic
fire may have eaufed this curious appearance.
The great bulk o f thefe blocks renders them fo confpicuous, that
the attention is firft ftruck with them upon approaching the ifland.
But, befides granite, there is on the north fide, where the ifland is
particularly low and narrow, a flip o f calcareous earth, o f a few
hundred yards in length, which difeovers itfelf near the furface of
the water. It is not for the moft part pure, for broken pieces o f
U 2 the