[* M. DE FLEURIEU.]

CHAPTER IX.

Examination of the coast resumed. 
Encounter Bay. 
The capes Bernouilli and Jaffa. 
Baudin’s Rocks. 
Differences in the bearings on tacking. 
Cape Buffon, the eastern limit of the French discovery. 
The capes Northumberland and Bridgewater of captain Grant. 
Danger from a south-west gale. 
King’s Island, in Bass’ Strait:  Anchorage there. 
Some account of the island. 
Nautical observations. 
New Year’s Isles. 
Cape Otway, and the north-west entrance to Bass’ Strait. 
Anchorage in, and examination of Port Phillip. 
The country and inhabitants. 
Nautical observations.

[SOUTH COAST. ENCOUNTER BAY]

FRIDAY 9 APRIL 1802

I returned with Mr. Brown on board the Investigator at half past eight in the morning, and we then separated from Le Geographe; captain Baudin’s course being directed to the north-west, and ours to the southward.  We had lost ground during the night, and the wind was very feeble at east, so that the French ship was in sight at noon, and our situation was as follows: 

Latitude observed, 35 deg. 44’
Longitude by time keepers, 138 53
Cape Jervis bore N. 821/2 W.
Hummock at the east end of the high land, N. 41/2 E.
Nearest sandy hillock, dist. 3 or 4 leagues, N. 65 E.

At the place where we tacked from the shore on the morning of the 8th, the high land of Cape Jervis had retreated from the waterside, the coast was become low and sandy, and its trending was north-east; but after running four or five leagues in that direction it curved round to the south-eastward, and thus formed a large bight or bay.  The head of this bay was probably seen by captain Baudin in the afternoon; and in consequence of our meeting here, I distinguished it by the name of ENCOUNTER BAY.  The succeeding part of the coast having been first discovered by the French navigator, I shall make use of the names in describing it which he or his country men have thought proper to apply; that is, so far as the volume published enables me to make them out; but this volume being unaccompanied with charts, and containing few latitudes and longitudes by which the capes and bays can be identified, I must be excused should any errors be committed in the nomenclature.

There was no wind from noon to two o’clock; and it appeared by the lead that the ship was drifted to the west-north-west, probably by a flood tide.  On a breeze springing up from the southward we stretched in for the shore; and at six in the evening it was four miles distant, being sandy and generally very low; but there were several hillocks upon it high enough to be seen four or five leagues from a ship’s deck, and one of them, more bluff than the rest, and nearly destitute of vegetation, bore N. 17 deg.  E. Next day [SATURDAY 10 APRIL 1802] at noon our situation was within three miles of the land, but very little advanced beyond that of the preceding day, our latitude being 35 deg. 49 1/3’, and the bluff hummock in sight bearing N. 22 deg.  W.