Early in the afternoon, the lighthouse on Low Head appeared like a white speck resting on the blue horizon; and by evening we found ourselves at anchor just within the reefs fronting the west entrance point of Port Dalrymple.  The first appearance of the Tamar river is not very inviting to the seaman.  A rapid stream, thrown out of its course, hemmed in by numerous reefs, and passing over a bottom so uneven as to cause a change in the soundings from 12 to 26, and then 18 fathoms, with a ripple or line of broken water across the mouth renders it impossible in strong North-West winds for a stranger to detect the channels, and raises so much sea that the pilots cannot reach the vessels that arrive off the mouth.

As the Beagle passed through the west channel, the shear or first beacon on the west reefs was on with a round-topped hill some distance up the river.  Although there is very apparent difficulty in navigating the Tamar, still the first glance shows it to be a stream of importance.  Its valley, although not wide, may be traced for miles abruptly separating the ranges of hills.  We can easily imagine, therefore, the joy experienced by Captain Flinders on first discovering it in 1798, and thus bestowing a solid and lasting benefit on the future Tasmanian colonists.  This is not, however, the only portion of Australasia whose inhabitants are indebted for the riches they are reaping from the soil, to the enterprising spirit of Captain Flinders.

George Town is a straggling village lying two miles within the entrance of the Tamar; in its neighbourhood were found greenstone, basalt, and trappean rocks.  Launceston, the northern capital of Tasmania, lies thirty miles up the river, or rather at the confluence of the two streams called the North and South Esk, which form it.

SIR JOHN FRANKLIN.

We found that the Governor was attending not only to the present but the future welfare of the colonists, by examining into the most eligible spots for erecting lighthouses at the eastern entrance of Bass Strait, fronting the North-East extreme of Tasmania, the numerous dangers besetting which have been fatal to several vessels.  These buildings will be lasting records of the benefits the colony derived from Sir John Franklin’s government.

As we subsequently visited the Tamar, it is needless to give here the little information we gathered during our brief stay.  Our observations were made on the south point of Lagoon Bay, where we found a whaleboat belonging to a party of sealers just arrived with birds’ feathers and skins for the Launceston market.  They had left their wives and families, including their dogs, on the islands they inhabit.

RETURN TO PORT PHILLIP.

On the morning of the 22nd, we were again out of the Tamar, and making the best of our way to Port Phillip for a meridian distance.  There was little tide noticed in the middle of the Strait; the greatest depth we found was 47 fathoms, 68 miles North-West from the Tamar, where the nature of the bottom was a grey muddy sand or marl.