Us Character and Productiotis. 197 



■almost directly, and as they are respectively at the east and 

 west extremities of the bay in which the Settlement is 

 placed, and not more than three miles and a half apart, they 

 add much to the danger. On these Bambora Rocks the 

 Sirius was wrecked from this cause in 1791. 



Norfolk Island, of an irregular quadrangular form, is 

 about seven miles in length from east to west, by four in 

 breadth from north to south. From the survey taken by 

 Major Burney, the Commanding Eoyal Engineer of New 

 South Wales, in 1840, we learn that the superficial extent 

 of the island, usually reckoned at 14,000, is 8960 acres;* 

 of this, 1080 acres were then cleared for agriculture, and 

 about 1000 were pasturage. The relative proportions of these 

 have since varied, and rather more land has been brought 

 into cultivation. 



The average height of the island is from 300 to 400 feet 

 above the level of the surrounding ocean, although the land 

 is generally higher on the northern side. In this direction 

 lofty perpendicular chfFs bound the shore, and Mount Pitt, 

 with its double summit, rises to an elevation of 1050 feet 

 above the level of the sea. From hence the surface has a 

 gradual declension towards the south, and terminates in a 

 level flat, but little above high watermark, on which the 

 Settlement is placed. The surface is so irregular that, in 

 the language of a sailor, f if correctly laid down in -a plan, 

 with all the hills and valleys accurately represented, Norfolk 

 Island would very much resemble the waves of the sea in a 

 gale of wind ; for it is composed wholly of long, narrow, 

 .and very steep ridges of hills with deep gullies, which are as 

 narrow at the bottom as the hills are .at the top. 



The soil of the island is very uniform, consisting of a 



* Correspondence respecting Convict Discipline, 1846. 

 t Capt.Htmter's Voyage,^1791. 



