250 Account of Peron's Peninsula. 



. This peninsula is included between 113° 24' and 114° E. longi- 

 tude, and 25° 30' and 26° 15' S. latitude. Its length from north- 

 west to south-east is about fifty miles, and its general breadth va- 

 ries between twelve and fifteen. The isthmus of Taillefer, by 

 which it is joined to the continent, is about a mile and a quarter 

 broad. 



Captain Baudin's expedition appears to have been the first, after 

 Dampier, that visited this place, * the desolate appearance of which 

 has been pourtrayed by M. Peron, the amiable zoologist of that ex- 

 pedition, as extreme, and the climate, both as to the heat by day 

 and the cold by night, as perfectly insupportable. 



The expedition under Captain Freycinet was its next visitor, t 

 and M. Arago, in his narrative of that voyage, thus describes its 

 appearance : " The coast, from the moment we first saw it, exhi- 

 bited nothing but a picture of desolation ; no rivulet consoled tlie 

 eye, no tree attracted it ; no mountain gave variety to the land- 

 scape, no dwelling was seen to enliven it : every where reigned 

 sterility and death. Its outline is uniform, without breaks, almost 

 without diflference, and always very low. In the evening the sun 

 sets ; no voice disturbs the silence of this melancholy solitude ; a 

 sharp cold benumbs the limbs. In the morning the sun re-ap- 

 pears : a consuming heat oppresses us ; we seek repose and find 

 nothing but fatigue. What a frightful abode \" | " Several of our 

 people attempted different excursions on the Peninsula, without 

 finding a single rivulet of fresh water. It is to be presumed, there- 

 fore, that the poor natives drink only salt water, and live AvhoUy 

 on fish and a kind of pulse resembling our French beans, that is 

 met with here and there in the interior." 



The number of natives seen on this peninsula by M. Peron did 

 not exceed thirty. They were armed with assagays and clubs ; 

 and during the stay of the expedition, their general conduct evin- 

 ced a disposition to hostility and treachery, and in fact on one oc- 

 casion they actually succeeded in forcing one of the boats to quit 



pilation, the sources of which are open to examination, and as it is judiciously 

 drawn up, we comply with the author's request to withhold his name. 



In our iir.«t volume, p. 446, will be found a similar analysis of the information 

 which is scattered through different works, respecting the country on the banks 

 of Swan River. Ed. 



* The Geographe anchored in Dampier's Bay on the 2d July 1801. On the 

 3d a most violent gale of wind (it being the depth of winter there) obliged the 

 ship to quit the roads and put out to sea ; and during the nights of the 3d and 

 4th, they were in great danger of being cast upon some of the numerous shoals 

 and sand-banks near Cape Shoals. They were finally obliged to sail from thence 

 to Timor on the 6th of July. The Naturaliste arrived in Dampier's Bay on the 

 16th of the same month and year, and remained there until the 4th September. 

 The Geographe was again there from the 16th to the 26th of March 1803. 



-|- The Uranie arrived in Dampier's Bay in August 1818, and remained there 

 to the latter end of September. 



X Vide " Narrative of a Voyage round the World," by J. Arago. 



