On the 30th, had little wind westerly; dark gloomy weather; with snow and sleet at times; several whales seen playing about the ship, but very few birds; islands of ice in plenty, and a swell from W.N.W.

On the 31st, little wind from the westward, fair and clear weather, which afforded an opportunity to air the spare sails, and to clean and smoke the ship between decks.  At noon our latitude was 59 deg. 40’ S., longitude 135 deg. 11’ W. Our observation to-day gave us reason to conjecture that we had a southerly current.  Indeed, this was no more than what might reasonably be supposed, to account for such huge masses of ice being brought from the south.  In the afternoon we had a few hours calm, succeeded by a breeze from the east, which enabled us to resume our N.W. by N. course.

1774 January

January 1st, the wind remained not long at east, but veered round by the south to the west; blew fresh, attended with snow showers.  In the evening, being in the latitude of 58 deg. 39’ S., we passed two islands of ice, after which we saw no more till we stood again to the south.

At five o’clock in the morning on the 2d, it fell calm; being at this time in the latitude of 58 deg. 2’, longitude 137 deg. 12’.  The calm being succeeded by a breeze at east, we steered N.W. by W. My reason for steering this course, was to explore part of the great space of sea between us and our track to the south.

On the 3d, at noon, being in latitude 56 deg. 46’, longitude 139 deg. 45’, the weather became fair, and the wind veered to S.W.  About this time we saw a few small divers (as we call them) of the peterel tribe, which we judged to be such as are usually seen near land, especially in the bays, and on the coast of New Zealand.  I cannot tell what to think of these birds; had there been more of them, I should have been ready enough to believe that we were, at this time, not very far from land, as I never saw one so far from known land before.  Probably these few had been drawn thus far by some shoal of fish; for such were certainly about us, by the vast number of blue peterels, albatrosses, and such other birds as are usually seen in the great ocean; all or most of which left us before night.  Two or three pieces of seaweed were also seen, but these appeared old and decayed.

At eight o’clock in the evening, being in the latitude of 56 deg.  S., longitude 140 deg. 31’ W., the wind fixing in the western board, obliged us to steer north-easterly, and laid me under the necessity of leaving unexplored a space of the sea to the west, containing near 40 deg. of longitude, and half that of latitude.  Had the wind continued favourable, I intended to have run 15 or 20 degrees of longitude more to the west in the latitude we were then in, and back again to the east in the latitude of 50 deg..  This route would have so intersected the space above mentioned, as hardly to have left room for the bare supposition of any land lying there.  Indeed, as it was, we have little reason to believe that there is; but rather the contrary, from the great hollow swell we had had, for several days, from the W. and N.W., though the wind had blown from a contrary direction great part of the time; which is a great sign we had not been covered by any land between these two points.