TUESDAY 7 DECEMBER 1802

Next morning, the wind was at N. E.; and after weathering a reef which runs out three miles from the island under Cape Van Diemen, we closed in with the land, and steered westward along it with soundings from 9 to 4 fathoms.  A low head with white cliffs was passed at nine o’clock, and proved to be the northernmost point of this land; beyond it the coast extended W. by S., in a long sandy beach, and the country was better clothed with trees than on the south side.  At noon we came abreast of a low woody point, with a shoal running off, where the coast took a south-west direction; and our situation and bearings were then as under: 

Latitude, observed to the north., 16 deg. 26’
Longitude, from time keeper and bearings, 139 25
Cliffy north head of this land, N. 86 E.
Woody shoal point, distant two miles, S. 35 E.
Furthest southern extreme, S. 29 W.
Islet from the mast head, distant 3 leagues, North.

From one o’clock till four, we steered S. S. W. past three other small cliffy projections; and I then saw the clump of high trees on the south-west point of this land, bearing S. 31 deg.  E. six miles, the same which had been set five days before from the inner side.  Our course was continued, to get in with the main land; but in half an hour the depth had diminished to 21/2 fathoms, and obliged us to haul out W. by N., close to the wind.  The low main coast was then in sight from the mast head to the south-westward, and at dusk we anchored about three leagues off, in 5 fathoms, sandy bottom.

No doubt remained that the land of Cape Van Diemen was an island; for it had been circumnavigated, with the exception of about three leagues, which the rocks and shoal water made impracticable.  Its extent is considerable, being thirty-five miles long, and the circumference near ninety, independently of the smaller sinuosities in the coast; I did not land upon any part, but the surface appeared to be more rocky than sandy; and judging from the bushes and trees with which it is mostly covered, there must be some portion, though perhaps a small one, of vegetable soil.  In any other part of the world, this would be deemed low land; but here, where even the tops of the trees on the main scarcely exceed a ship’s mast head in elevation, it must be called moderately high; for it may in some parts, reach three hundred feet.  Several smokes and some natives were seen, and it is reasonable to suppose there are fixed inhabitants, but their number is probably small.

Had not the name of Van Diemen so often occurred in Terra Australis, as to make confusion, I should have extended it from the cape to the whole island; but such being the case, I have taken this opportunity of indulging my gratitude to a nobleman of high character and consideration; who, when governor-general of British India, humanely used his efforts to relieve me from an imprisonment which was super-added to a shipwreck in the sequel of the voyage.  This large island is therefore distinguished by the name of Isle Mornington; and to the whole of the group, now discovered to exist at the head of the Gulph of Carpentaria, I have given the appellation of WELLESLEY’S ISLANDS.