or twelve miles.* In the afternoon, the depth again decreased to 4
fathoms, and obliged them to anchor until morning. On the 31st, the ships
appear to have steered south-westward, leaving on the starbord hand a
very extensive bank, on which the long boat had 2 fathoms water: the
soundings from the Hormuzeer were from 3 to 7 fathoms. At noon, the
latitude was 9° 27', and no land in sight. The soundings then increased
gradually; and at sunset, no bottom could be found at 40 fathoms. A swell
coming from S. S. W. announced an open sea in that direction; and that
the dangers of Torres' Strait were, at length, surmounted.

[* Mr. Bampton's chart and journal are more at variance here than in the
preceding parts of the Strait, and I have found it very difficult to
adjust them; but have attempted it in Plate XIII.]

This passage of the Hormuzeer and Chesterfield in _seventy-two_ days,
with that made in _nineteen_, by the captains Bligh and Portlock,
displayed the extraordinary dangers of the Strait; and appear to have
deterred all other commanders from following them, up to the time of the
Investigator. Their accounts confirm the truth of Torres having passed
through it, by showing the correctness of the sketch contained in his
letter to the King of Spain.

CONCLUSIVE REMARKS.

The sole remaining information, relative to the North Coast of Terra
Australis, was contained in a note, transcribed by Mr. Dalrymple, from a
work of burgomaster WITSEN upon the _Migration of Mankind_. The place of
which the burgomaster speaks, is evidently on the coast of Carpentaria,
near the head of the Gulph; but it is called _New Guinea; and he wrote in
1705_. The note is as follows; but upon whose authority it was given,