TRANSCRIPTION
AS SOON AS it was light on 1 Germinal [22 March] we sighted the land to leeward of us, stretching from South-East to North-East by North. It was with great relief that I saw myself a reasonable distance from it - that is to say, roughly 4 leagues by my reckoning. We continued to keep as close to as possible under courses, and at sunrise I filled the topsails (with all [reefs] taken) in order to bring us better up into the wind. It was still squally and violent; nevertheless, the sky was fine, although very hazy.
Having clearly sighted the rock which the English call the Pyramid, we doubled it at seven o'clock at a distance of about 1/4 of a league. When we had it to the West of us, the Kent group of islands lay North by North-West. As our position was well-determined then, I decided to obtain a little shelter from the wind and sea on the eastern side of the Furneaux Group, for I saw no sign of a change in the weather.
After doubling the Pyramid, we soon sighted the second rock * that the English chart indicates to the South and West of the Kent islands. We doubled it at the same distance as the first in order to enter the channel that it forms with these islands. The passage is good, but the sea was extremely heavy and the current swift, for we paid out 11 and 12 knots on the log. Had the weather been more moderate, I would have sounded all through this channel, but there was no way of attending to it with conditions as they were. I would also have gone through the channel between the Kent islands.† There may possibly be a good anchorage in it, although there is little sign of it and we did coast fairly close along the islands, both to West and East, in order to see most of the bays there.
At midday the latitude observed was 39° 22' 44", which corresponds almost exactly with that given these islands on the chart. We were possibly 3' North of them. As we had no hour- angle, we do not know if their longitude agrees with the one we might have observed.
None of the islands appeared to me to offer much in the way of resources for navigators. They even look to be just mountain peaks upon which there is only very little vegetation, although now and then one sees an isolated tree. The 'pyramid' is nothing but an arid rock, and the small island opposite the Kent Group is the same. But at the northern tip of this latter, there are two rocks which project a fair way out to sea and which look like two small haystacks. The English map does not mention them.‡
* South-West Isle.
† Murray Passage.
‡ These are the judgment Rocks. There are, however, more than two
of them.
