water shoaled rapidly to 40 fathoms in fifteen miles; but very gradually
afterwards to 15 fathoms in fifty miles. This slope of the bank was
determined by several boards in working to the westward.)

RETURN TO SWAN RIVER.

The glimpse we got of the string of islands lying between Barrow's Island
and the North-west Cape, was quite unexpected, as the next land we had
intended seeing was Swan River. After rounding the North-west Cape, we
had the usual southerly winds, but a strong breeze from the north-west
overtook us in latitude 30 degrees 40 minutes South and longitude 112
degrees 25 minutes East, and shortened the passage, bringing us on the
27th to an anchorage under the east end of Rottnest Island, where we
found a current sweeping round to the southward, at the rate of nearly a
knot an hour. There had not been any previously felt; but in latitude 30
degrees South and longitude 110 degrees East, two days before the
north-wester, it set two knots to the northward; another instance of how
entirely the currents are governed by the winds off this coast.

NATIVE TALENT.

Our Swan River native had not obtained so much information of his wild
countrymen to the northward as Miago. Still he had made the most of what
he saw; and his visit to Timor crowned all. The facility and rapidity
with which he could make a song about anyone whom he might choose as the
subject of his poetical fancy, was very amusing; he must have equalled
many of the Italian improvisatori. He had also got a very good idea of
where the ship had been since leaving Swan River, in his head. The
drawings of his countrymen on Depuch Island had greatly hurt his vanity,
whilst they excited his emulation; and always afterwards, whenever he