THE PACIFIC OCEAN. 



107 



The foil on the fiat land is either fandy, or confifls of a yel- '777- 



lowifli mould, and, in fome places, of a reddifh clay. The ' . — ^ 



fame is found on the lower part of the hills ; but farther 

 up, efpecially where there are few trees, it is of a grey tough 

 caft, to appearance very poor. 



In the valleys between the hills, the water drains down 

 from their fides ; and at laft, in fome places, forms fmall 

 brooks; fuch indeed as were fufficient to fupply us with 

 water, but by no means of that fize Vv^e might exped: in fo 

 extenfive a country, efpecially as it is both hilly and well 

 wooded. Upon the whole, it has many marks of being 

 naturally a very dry country ; and perhaps might (inde- 

 pendent of its wood) be compared to Africa, about the Cape 

 of Good Hope, though that lies ten degrees farther North- 

 ward, rather than to New Zealand, on its other fide, in the 

 fame latitude, where we find every valley, however fmall, 

 f urnifhed with a confiderable ftream of water. The heat too 

 appears to be great, as the thermometer flood at 64, 70, and 

 once at 74. And it was remarked, that birds were feldom 

 killed an hour or two, before they were almofl covered with 

 fmall maggots, which I would rather attribute merely to 

 the heat ; as we had not any reafon to fuppofe there is a pe- 

 culiar difpofition in the climate to render fubflances fooa 

 putrid. 



No mineral bodies, nor indeed ftones of any other fort, 

 but the white fand one already mentioned, were obferved. 



Amongll the vegetable produdlions, there is not one, that 

 we could find, which afforded the fmalleft fubfiftence for 

 man. 



The forell trees are all of one fort, growing to a great 

 height, and in general quite flraight, branching but little, 



P 2 till 



