200 
A VOYAGE TO 
[South Coast. 
^802. compass steady, they were again taken. Differences always took 
Friday 16. place; and without any exception the bearings required a, greater 
allowance of variation to the right after tacking, when the head was 
■westward, than before, when eastward ; agreeing with the differences 
so frequently found in the azimuths and amplitudes, which had always 
been to show a greater east or less west variation when the head was 
on the west side of the meridian. The least average difference in any 
one of five sets of bearings was 4-°, the greatest 7 0 , and the mean 5|°; 
and according to the system adopted in correcting the variations, ex- 
plained in the Appendix No. II. to the second volume, the mean dif- 
ference arising from the five changes in the direction of the ship's 
head, should be 5 0 35'. 
The eastern wind died away at noon of the 16th, and the ship 
scarcely had steerage way until after midnight ; a breeze then sprung 
up from the north-westward, and we steered north-east to make the 
Saturday 17. land near Cape Buffon. At half past seven the cape bore N. i° W. 
seven miles, and was ascertained to be in nearly 37 0 36' south, and 
140* io' east. There is a bight in the coast on its north side, where 
the land was not distinctly seen all round, owing probably to its 
being alow beach. At nine o'clock we bore away southward, keep- 
ing at the distance of two or three miles from the shore. It was the 
same kind of hummock-topped bank as before described ; but a ridge 
of moderately high hills, terminated to the southward by a bluff, was 
visible over it, three or four leagues inland ; and there was a reef of 
rocks lying in front of the shore. At noon, two larger rocks were 
seen at the southern end of the reef, and are those called by the 
French, the Carpenters. They lie one or two miles from a sandy 
projection named by them Cape Boufflers ; but here a prior title to 
discovery interferes. 
On arriving at Port Jackson, I learned, and so did captain Bau- 
din, that this coast had been before visited. Lieutenant (now captain) 
James Grant, commander of His Majesty's brig Lady Nelson, saw the 
above projection, which he named Cape Banks, x>n Dec. 3, 1800 ; and 
