1770 DAMPIER'S VOYAGE TO NEW HOLLAND 297 



customs as came under my observation in the several 

 places we landed upon during the run along the coast. 

 Dampier in general seems to be a faithful relater ; but in 

 the voyage in which he touched on the coast of New 

 Holland he was in a ship of pirates ; possibly himself not a 

 little tainted by their idle examples, he might have kept no 

 written journal of anything more than the navigation of the 

 ship, and when upon coming home he was solicited to publish 

 an account of his voyage, may have referred to his memory 

 for many particulars relating to the people, etc. These 

 Indians, when covered with their filth, which I believe they 

 never wash off, are, if not coal black, very near it. As negroes, 

 then, he might well esteem them, and add the woolly hair 

 and want of two front teeth in consequence of the similitude 

 in complexion between these and the natives of Africa ; but 

 from whatever cause it might arise, certain it is that 

 Dampier either was very much mistaken in his account, 

 or else saw a very different race of people from those we 

 have seen. 



In the whole length of coast which we sailed along, there 

 was a very unusual sameness to be observed in the face of 

 the country. Barren it may justly be called, and in a very 

 high degree, so far at least as we saw. The soil in general 

 is sandy and very light ; on it grow grass, tall enough but 

 thin set, and trees of a tolerable size ; never, however, near 

 together, being in general 40, 50, and 60 feet apart. 

 This, and spots of loose sand, sometimes very large, con- 

 stitute the general face of the country as you sail along it, 

 and indeed the greater part even after penetrating inland 

 as far as our situation would allow us to do. The banks of 

 the bays were generally clothed with thick mangroves, some- 

 times for a mile or more in breadth. The soil under these 

 is rank mud, always overflowed every spring tide. Inland 

 you sometimes meet with a bog upon which the grass grows 

 rank and thick, so that no doubt the soil is sufficiently 

 fertile. The valleys also between the hills, where runs of 

 water come down, are thickly clothed with underwood ; but 

 they are generally very steep and narrow, so that upon the 



