60 TORY CHANNEL. [PART I. 



surface sharp shingly fragments of slate are strewed 

 about. Low stunted fern and manuka are abun- 

 dant. From the top of these hills the northern 

 entrance of Queen Charlotte's Sound opened to our 

 view. The island of Motuara bore north-by-east. 

 We saw the sea over the narrow island of Arapaoa 

 in Cook's Straits, and our eye wandered over Ship 

 Cove, Shag Cove, East Bay, and part of West Bay. 

 The land has everywhere the same mountainous 

 and intersected character. A few paces farther 

 another extensive panorama opens : we look into 

 Port Underwood, a deep inlet, formed on both sides 

 by chains of hills, from which numerous buttresses 

 run out towards the sea, and form as many small 

 coves. Port Underwood opens to the south-west 

 into Cook's Straits. The coast sweeps round to- 

 wards Cape Campbell, forming what Cook has 

 named Cloudy Bay, and a range of high snow-clad 

 mountains in the middle island, called Kai Koura 

 (Feast of Crawfish), shut in the view. 



The chain of hills which form Port Underwood 

 to the south-east, in fact all the land which separates 

 that port from Tory Channel, consists of a succes- 

 sion of steep and barren ridges. Only here and 

 there a patch of brushwood or trees relieves the 

 brown and gloomy tint of the Pteris esculenta. The 

 chain to the south-west, however, on the other side 

 of the harbour, is more wooded, although the hills 

 are equally steep ; its offsets branch into the sea, 

 and form a few small coves. To the south-south- 



