outh 41 degrees East
for sixteen or seventeen miles; the Tamar anchored under it. Roe
manuscript.)

The land behind CAPE TRIBULATION may be seen at a greater distance than
twenty leagues. It is here that the outer part of the barrier reefs
approach the coast, and there is reason to believe that, in latitude 16
degrees 17 minutes 35 seconds, longitude 145 degrees 27 minutes 40
seconds, they are not more than twenty miles from it. The cape has a
hillock at its extremity, and a small rocky islet close to the shore that
renders it conspicuous: it is fourteen miles beyond Snapper Island. The
shore appears to be bold to: at three miles off we had sixteen fathoms.

Ten miles further to the northward is BLOMFIELD'S RIVULET in Weary Bay:
it is blocked up by a rocky bar, having only four feet water over it; the
anchorage off it is too much exposed to be safe. The river runs up for
four or five miles, having soundings within it from three to four
fathoms, its entrance is in 15 degrees 55 minutes 50 seconds.

The coast then extends to the north to Endeavour River, and forms a few
inconsiderable sinuosities; it is backed by high land, particularly
abreast of the Hope Islands. These islands open of each other in a North
39 degrees East direction, and appear to be connected by a shoal; it is
however very likely that a narrow passage may exist between them, but
certainly not safe to sail through.

Here the number of the coral reefs begin to increase, and great attention
must be paid in navigating amongst them; but, with a careful look out
from the masthead, and a quick leadsman in the chains, no danger need be
apprehended.

Between reef a and the shoal off the south-west Hope Island there is a
passage two miles wide, with twelve fathoms: a is about half a mile in
diameter, with a few rocks above water; its centre is in 15 degrees 43
minutes 20 seconds, two miles from the shore, and three miles North 55
degrees West from the south west Hope.

b is about a mile and a quarter long, and has a dry rock at its north
end, the latitude of which is 15 degrees 39 minutes 20 seconds: it is
divided from Endeavour Reef by a channel of nearly a mile wide, and
fifteen fathoms deep: abreast of the south end of b, on the western edge
of Endeavour Reef, there is a dry rock, in latitude 15 degrees 39 minutes
55 seconds.

ENDEAVOUR REEF is nine miles long; it lies in a North-West direction; the
north end, in 15 degrees 39 minutes South, bears due