Bountiful Islands form the eastern part of a group called Wellesley Islands, and were so named by Flinders from the great supply of turtle he found there.  As, however, it was two months before the season of their visiting the shores, we only caught twelve, for the most part females.  Near the islands was noticed the same shrubby thick compact kind of seaweed, that had previously been seen on the parts of the North-west coast frequented by the turtle.  Flinders speaks of finding here in one turtle as many as 1,940 eggs; and such is their fecundity that were it not for the destruction of the young by sharks and birds of prey, these temperate seas would absolutely swarm with them.

Our anchorage was in 7 fathoms, three quarters of a mile South-East from the highest hill, which I called Mount Flinders; it stands close to the beach, near the east end of the island, and is in latitude 16 degrees 40 minutes 0 seconds South, longitude 7 degrees 45 minutes 25 seconds East of Port Essington.

BOUNTIFUL ISLANDS.

Bountiful Islands, two in number, are distant a mile and a half in a North-East direction from each other.  The northern and largest is two miles and a half long, and three-quarters of a mile wide; whilst the other is rather more than half a mile each way, and has at the northern end a mound with a remarkable casuarina tree on its summit.  Both are fronted with coral reefs, particularly at the North-East extreme; there are some cliffs on the south-east side of the large island of sand and ironstone formation, the latter prevailing; and over the low north-western parts a ferruginous kind of gravel was scattered.  The crests of the hills or hillocks were of a reddish sort of sandstone, and so honeycombed or pointed at the top that it was difficult to walk over them.

MOUNT FLINDERS.

Near the landing-place, at the foot of Mount Flinders, were a few isolated gum-trees, and small clusters of the casuarina, which were the only trees on the northern island.  Some drift timber was on the south-east and north-west sides.  On the latter was a tree of considerable size, doubtless brought from the shore of the Gulf by the North-West monsoon.  Its whole surface was covered with a long brown kind of grass, interwoven with creepers.  There were great quantities of a cinnamon-coloured bittern seen, as well as quails, doves, and large plovers, but not any of the bustards mentioned by Flinders.  We saw no traces of land animals of any kind; neither did we of the natives.  A flock of screaming white cockatoos had taken up their abode on the south island, where also some bulbs of the Angustifolia were found.  A few small fish, besides sharks, were caught alongside the ship.

I was surprised to find the tides an hour later than at Van Diemen’s Inlet; their velocity, likewise, was increased to two knots; the flood-stream came from the north-east at the anchorage.

FOWLER ISLAND.

July 7.