Next day was employed in shifting the topmasts on account of some rents found in the heels.  The scientific gentlemen landed again to examine the natural productions of the island, and in the evening eleven more kangaroos were brought on board; but most of these were smaller, and seemed to be of a different species to those of the preceding day.  Some of the party saw several large running birds; which, according to their description, seemed to have been the emu or cassowary.

Not being able to obtain a distinct view from any elevated situation, I took a set of angles from a small projection near the ship, named Kangaroo Head; but nothing could be seen to the north, and the sole bearing of importance, more than had been taken on board, was that of a high hill at the extremity of the apparently unconnected land to the eastward:  it bore N. 39 deg. 10’ E., and was named Mount Lofty.  The nearest part of that land was a low point bearing N. 60 deg.  E. nine or ten miles; but the land immediately at the back was high, and its northern and southern extremes were cliffy.  I named it CAPE JERVIS, and it was afterwards sketched by Mr. Westall. (Atlas Plate XVII.  View 12.)

All the cliffs of Kangaroo Island seen to the west of the anchorage had the appearance of being calcareous, and the loose stones scattered over the surface of Kangaroo Head and the vicinity were of that substance; but the basis in this part seemed to be a brown slate, lying in strata nearly horizontal, and laminae of quartz were sometimes seen in the interstices.  In some places the slate was split into pieces of a foot long, or more, like iron bars, and had a shining, ore-like appearance; and the strata were then further from the horizontal line than I observed them to be elsewhere.

A thick wood covered almost all that part of the island visible from the ship; but the trees in a vegetating state were not equal in size to the generality of those lying on the ground, nor to the dead trees standing upright.  Those on the ground were so abundant that in ascending the higher land a considerable part of the walk was made upon them.  They lay in all directions, and were nearly of the same size and in the same progress towards decay; from whence it would seem that they had not fallen from age, nor yet been thrown down in a gale of wind.  Some general conflagration, and there were marks apparently of fire on many of them, is perhaps the sole cause which can be reasonably assigned; but whence came the woods on fire?  That there were no inhabitants upon the island, and that the natives of the continent did not visit it, was demonstrated, if not by the want of all signs of such visit, yet by the tameness of the kangaroo, an animal which, on the continent, resembles the wild deer in timidity.  Perhaps lightning might have been the cause, or possibly the friction of two dead trees in a strong wind; but it would be somewhat extraordinary that the same thing should have happened at Thistle’s Island, Boston Island and at this place, and apparently about the same time.  Can this part of Terra Australis have been visited before, unknown to the world?  The French navigator, La Perouse, was ordered to explore it, but there seems little probability that he ever passed Torres’ Strait.