172 cook's first voyage august, 



the woods. Of land fowls we saw crows, kites, 

 hawks, cockatoos of two sorts, one white and the 

 other black, a very beautiful kind of loriquets, some 

 parrots, pigeons of two or thr^ee sorts, and several 

 small birds not known in Europe. The water-fowls 

 are herns, whistling ducks, which perch, and, I be- 

 lieve, roost upon trees, wild geese, curlieus, and a 

 few others ; but these do not abound. The face of 

 the country, which has been occasionally mentioned 

 before, is agreeably diversified by hill and valley, 

 lawn and wood. The soil of the hills is hard, dry, 

 and stony, yet it produces course grass besides wood: 

 the soil of the plains and valleys is in some places 

 sand, and in some clay ; in some also it is rocky and 

 stony, like the hills ; in general, however, it is well 

 clothed, and has at least the appearance of fertility. 

 The whole country, both hill and valley, wood and 

 plain, abounds with ant-hills, some of which are six 

 or eight feet high, and twice as much in circumfer- 

 ence. The trees here are not of many sorts ; the 

 gum *tree, which we found on the southern part of 

 the coast, is the most common, but here it is not so 

 large : on each side of the river, through its whole 

 course, there are mangroves in great numbers, which 

 in some places extend a mile within the coast. The 

 country is in all parts well watered, there being 

 several fine rivulets at a small distance from each 

 other, but none in the place where we lay, at least 

 not during the time we were there, which was the 

 dry season ; we were, however, well supplied with 

 water by springs, which were not far off. 



In the afternoon of the 4th we had a gentle 

 breeze at S. E. and clear weather, but as I did not 

 intend to sail till the morning, I sent all the boats 

 to the reef, to get what turtle and shell-fish they 

 could. At low water I went up to the mast-head, 

 and took a view of the shoals, which made a very 

 threatening appearance : I could see several at a 

 remote distance, and part of many of them was 



