in the water.  After a sharp and anxious race, I reached the last creek, which was now much swollen; while the difficulty of crossing was aggravated by my desire to save my gun.  Plunging in I reached the opposite shore just in time to see the huge jaws of the alligator extended close above the spot where I had quitted the water.  My deliverance was providential, and I could not refrain from shuddering as I sat gaining breath upon the bank after my escape, and watching the disappointed alligator lurking about as if still in hopes of making his supper upon me.  Waiting till the monster came close, I took a deliberate aim at his eye, which had only the effect of frightening him a little.

The wind, which was light, blew from the North-East from sunset last evening until noon, being the first land-wind we had yet experienced.  The temperature remained nearly the same as at Port Patterson, the maximum being here 86, and the minimum 81.

October 13.

We got on board about noon, and the next day Mr. Fitzmaurice returned.  He had found Table Hill to be a perfect natural fortress, accessible only at the South-East corner by a slight break in the line of cliffs surrounding it; the large inlet terminated in a creek passing close at the southern foot of the hill, where it branched off in an east and north-east direction, and in the course of three miles, became lost at the western extremity of some low thickly-wooded plains, which extended eastward as far as the eye could reach.  To the south lay McAdam Range, which declining to the eastward, was at length blended with the plain, the eye finding some difficulty in determining where the hills ended and the plain commenced.

Hopes of discovering A river.

All the soundings and other data for the chart, in the immediate neighbourhood, were collected by the 16th, when the ship was got underweigh, as soon as the tide, which here rose twenty feet, was high enough.  After passing through a channel, six and seven fathoms deep, which the dry extreme of the sandbank fronting the flat, extending off McAdam Range, bearing South-South-East led through, we hauled over to the westward for a swash way in the sands, extending off the north-west end of Clump Island.  In crossing the inlet, running under the south end of McAdam Range, we found as much as ten fathoms, a depth that led to the hope of its being of great importance, perhaps indeed the mouth of a river.  Passing between Clump and Quoin Islands, we anchored midway between the latter and Driftwood Island, a proceeding which the approach of high-water rendered necessary, as from the great fall of the tide we were obliged at that time to have at least seven fathoms.  We were now surrounded on all sides by flat shores, and from the masthead, I could trace the low land forming the western side of the principal channel.  The high land south of McAdam Range, was found to terminate in a remarkable peak, which in the certainty of our search proving successful, we named River Peak.  It was almost blended in one with a range beyond, yet the fact of the distance which really existed between them, did not escape our anxious observation; and it was indeed in the different shade of these two ranges, one being less distinct than the other, that we found ample confirmation of our hopes.