24.6 A VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY 
its returning by the wind or tide in the contrary 
direction, or from the southward, we must be 
completely exposed to it; circumstances may, 
however, become more favourable before such a 
change takes place. 
Sunday, 6th. — After we made fast last evening, 
some of us went ashore, and, in the course of the 
night, killed fourteen hares, and a number of glau- 
cous gulls, which were found with their young on 
the top of an insulated rock, about thirty feet 
high, situated near the mouth of a ravine, about 
five miles to the eastward. The coast here is very 
bold and precipitous, rising abruptly from the sea to 
the height of about eight hundred and fifty feet. At 
the foot of the rocks there is, indeed, in some 
places, a slope from forty to fifty yards in breadth, 
covered generally with the loose fragments of 
stone that fall from them. These rocks consist 
entirely of schistose sandstone, and a kind of 
slate-clay, of a light green colour. Along the 
face, and pretty near the top of these precipices, 
there are a number of insulated columns, or rather 
insulated masses, that resemble, in some measure, 
when viewed a little way off, the turrets of a di- 
lapidated building; but, when inspected more 
closely, that is, from the foot of the precipices, 
their natural structure is seen to great advantage ; 
and, as far as lofty and rugged cliffs can be said 
to be picturesque, some of those in question were 
eminently so. Nor is this romantic scene confined 
only to the rocks that faced the sea; on the con- 
trary, several of the ravines that ran inland, ex- 
hibited some that excelled the former, if possible, 
