HUNTER’S RIVER runs up for about fourteen miles.  It is about one mile and a half wide at the entrance, and preserves that width for more than four miles, when it suddenly contracts and becomes shoal, and very tortuous in its course, and winds through a narrow chasm in the rocks, which rise precipitously in some parts for at least two or three hundred feet.  A vessel may anchor in seven fathoms near the end of the first reach; its course is to the East-North-East.  There is a remarkable rock at the entrance, in latitude 15 degrees 1 minute 30 seconds, and longitude 125 degrees 24 minutes.  ROE’S RIVER first trends for seventeen miles to the East by South, and then, taking a sudden turn to the south, runs up for thirteen miles more; after which it trends to the South-East, and was supposed to run up for at least ten miles farther.  Its entrance for seven miles forms a very good harbour, being from two to six fathoms deep; but, in anchoring here, it must be recollected that the tide falls twenty-nine feet.  This river, like Hunter’s River, is bounded on either bank by precipitous hills, which, in many parts, are inaccessible.

Five miles to the westward of Cape Torrens is Point Hardy:  off the latter is an islet; and three miles, North by East 1/2 East from it, is a reef, on which the sea breaks.  This point is the east head of PORT NELSON, which extends to the southward from it for eight miles:  its western side is formed by the Coronation Islands:  its width is three miles, with good anchorage all over it.  At the bottom is CAREENING BAY, where the Mermaid was repaired.  The latitude of the beach in 15 degrees 6 minutes 18 seconds, and longitude 125 degrees 0 minutes 46 seconds.* Port Nelson communicates with the sea to the westward of the Coronation Islands, which may be considered a strait.  At the south-west end of the southernmost island, where the strait is narrowest, and not more than one mile and a quarter wide, there is a patch of rocks in the centre, which always shows:  the channel on the north side of these rocks is the best:  the water is very deep, and the tide sets right through.

(Footnote.  The latitude of the observatory was taken every day during our stay, using the sea-horizon, but the effect of refraction was so great that the daily observations varied as much as 3 minutes 43 seconds.

The mean of 15 meridional altitudes with the sextant made the latitude 15 degrees 6 minutes 22.5 seconds, and of fourteen observations with the circle 15 degrees 6 minutes 13.8 seconds.  Mean for the latitude of the observatory 15 degrees 6 minutes 18 seconds South.

The longitude was deduced by the mean of the observations of our two visits; namely, in October, 1820, and August, 1821:  the latter were taken at Sight Point, in Prince Regent’s River, the difference of the meridians of the two places, by chronometers and survey, being 8 minutes 52.8 seconds.

1820.  September 28 and 29.  By twenty sets of lunar distances with the sun, containing one hundred sights with the sextant, the sun being to the east of the moon, the longitude is 125 degrees 11 minutes 24.3 seconds.