136 THE ABROLHOS GROUl'. 



nothing indicating a shoal. Captain King passed 

 near this position, and also remarks not seeing it. 

 The Colonial schooner Champion, in beating to the 

 southward, has passed over and near its assigned 

 position, and I think we may fairly infer that there 

 is no such reef as the Turtle Dove, and that proba- 

 bly it originated from the south end of the Abrolhos 

 reef, ten miles N. N. W. of it, being seen. We found 

 29 fathoms on this supposed shoal, with 35, twelve 

 miles S. by E. of it, and 127, twenty-eight miles in the 

 same direction. Between it and the south end of the 

 Abrolhos Group the water deepened to 3.5 fathoms. 

 In approaching the nearest island we passed close 

 round the south-east end of a reef, running out about 

 a mile from the south point, and then trending away 

 round in a N. W. by N. direction, so as to form 

 one side of a lagoon, whilst the island I have men- 

 tioned— a long narrow strip trending N. E. by N. — 

 forms the other. The weather looking unsettled, 

 the wind being from the south-west, with slight rain 

 squalls, we were glad to find shelter, so near the 

 commencement of our work, in a bight on the east 

 side of the island, three-quarters of a mile from 

 the south point, where we anchored in 13 fathoms, 

 scarcely a quarter of a mile from the shore. A 

 coral patch, of two and a half fathoms, with only two 

 on its northern extreme, confines this anchorage, 

 which affords shelter from S. S. E. round by \Vest 

 to N. E. by N. The tide rose here 32 inches. 

 From the mast-head I got a tolerably good view 

 of the island, in some places scarcely a cable wide. 



