272 ' HISTORY OF 



doubt but that this account of Preservation 

 Island would in general answer for the descrip- 

 tion of any of them. 



He next describes what he saw of Cape Bar- 

 ren Island, which he understood, from the peo- 

 ple of the Nautilus snow, was an exact specimen 

 of those of the higher kind, so far as they had 

 observed of them. 



Cape Barren Island, which takes its name 

 from the cape so called by Captain Furneaux, is 

 a small island when compared with that lying to 

 the northward of it. From what was seen of it 

 in the sloop, it could only be conjectured that 

 these two were separate Islands ; but Mr. Bishop 

 had passed in the Nautilus through the channel 

 that divides them. 



This island is one of the higher kind that 

 consists of both high and low laud. The- high 

 part composed of granite, in man}^ places, in 

 others clothed with small gum trees, which draw 

 their support through some small quantity of 

 vegetable earth lodged by the broken blocks 

 and fragments of stone, and some straggling 

 brush-wood shooting up round the trees. 



The base of the low part is granite ; the sur- 

 face chiefly sand ; its produce, variety of brush- 

 wood, with some few small gum trees, and a spe- 

 cies of fir, that grows tall and straight to the 

 height of twenty or twenty- five feet. Within 

 the body of the brush there are several clear 

 spots, where the ground is partly rocky or san- 

 dy, partly wet and spongy. These are some- 

 what enlivened by beautiful flowering heath . 



1 I 



