LIZARD ISLAND. 345 



changing- from moderately high conical shaped 

 hills, to lofty table ranges about 500, or 600 feet 

 in height, trending about S.W. and by W. Having 

 still a little moonlight, we were enabled to keep 

 under weigh part of the night, and during the 

 first watch came to in 13 fathoms, in a bay on the 

 west side of Lizard Island, the extremes bearin": 

 from S. ^ E. to E. N. E. During the day we ex- 

 perienced a northerly current, varying from three 

 quarters to half an knot an hour. 



July 3. — We remained at this anchorage, until the 

 following morning, for the purpose of determining 

 the position of the island, and of visiting the peak, 

 which we found to be nearly twelve hundred feet 

 high. I ascended by a slope rising from the 

 shore of the small bay where our observations were 

 taken, and which may be easily distinguished, from 

 being the second from the north point of the island. 

 Their result was to place it in lat. 14° 40|' S. long. 

 13° 17f' East of Port Essington. Variation by 

 the mean of five or six needles was 71" E. being 

 half a degree more than it was at Cape Up- 

 start. Other magnetic observations were also 

 made, consisting of those for the dip and in- 

 tensity. 



In a valley to the left of the slope by which we 

 ascended the peak, were noticed several very re- 

 markable, low and spreading trees, with a dark 

 green foliage, and leaves large, ovate, and obtuse. 

 The branches, from which, when broken, a milky 



