General Sketch of the Coast. 1 7 



The land, on the east and south of the Gulf of Carpentaria, 

 is so low, that for a space of nearly six hundred miles, — from 

 Endeavour Strait to a range of hills on the mainland, west of 

 Wellesley Islands, at the bottom of the gulf, — no part of the 

 coast is higher than a ship's mast-head*. Some of the land 

 in Wellesley Islands is higher than the main ; but the largest 

 island is, probably, not more than one hundred and fifty feet 

 in height f ; and low-wooded hills occur on the mainland, from 

 thence to Sir Edward Pellew's group. — The rock observed on 

 the shore at Coen River, the only point on the eastern side of 

 the Gulf where Captain Flinders landed, was calcareous sand- 

 stone of recent concretional formation. 



In Sweer's Island, one of Wellesley's Isles, a hill of about 

 fifty or sixty feet in height was covered with a sandy calcareous 

 stone, having the appearance of ' concretions rising irregularly 

 about a foot above the general surface, without any distinct 

 ramifications.' The specimens from this place have evidently 

 the structure of stalactites, which seem to have been formed in 

 sand ; and the reddish carbonate of lime, by which the sand 

 has been agglutinated, is of the same character with that of 

 the west coast, where a similar concreted limestone occurs in 

 great abundance. 



The western shore of the Gulf of Carpentaria is somewhat 

 higher, and from Limmen's Bight to the latitude of Groote 

 Eylandt, is lined by a range of low hills. On the north of the 

 latter place, the coast becomes irregular and broken ; the base 

 of the country apparently consisting of primitive rocks, and 

 the upper part of the hills of a reddish sandstone ; — some of 

 the specimens of which are identical with that which occurs at 

 Goulburn and Sims Islands on the north coast, and is very 

 widely distributed on the north-west. The shore at the bot- 

 tom of Melville Bay is stated by Captain Flinders to consist of 

 low cliffs of pipe-clay, for a space of about eight miles in ex- 

 tent from east to west ; and similar cliffs of pipe-clay are de- 

 scribed as occurring at Goulburn Islands (see the Plate, vol. i. 

 p. 66), and at Lethbridge Bay, on the north of Melville Island; 

 both of which places are considerably to the west of the Gulf 

 of Carpentaria. 



Morgan's Island, a small islet in Blue-Mud Bay, on the north- 

 west of Groote Eylandt, is composed of clink-stone; and other 

 rocks of the trap-formation occur in several places on this coast. 



The north of Blue-Mud Bay has furnished also specimens 

 of ancient sandstone ; with columnar rocks, probably of clink- 

 stone. Round Hill, near Point Grindall, a promontory on the 



* Flinders's Charts, Plate XIV. f Flinders, vol. ii. p. 158. 



Vol. 68. No. 339. July 1826. C north 



