on which so much of our future destiny depended. Our distance, joined to
the haziness of the atmosphere, prevented us, however, from being able
to discover much. With our best glasses we could see nothing but hills
of a moderate height, cloathed with trees, to which some little patches
of white sandstone gave the appearance of being covered with snow. Many
fires were observed on the hills in the evening.

As no person in the ship I was on board had been on this coast before,
we consulted a little chart, published by Steele, of the Minories,
London, and found it, in general, very correct; it would be more so,
were not the Mewstone laid down at too great a distance from the land,
and one object made of the Eddystone and Swilly, when, in fact, they
are distinct. Between the two last is an entire bed of impassable rocks,
many of them above water. The latitude of the Eddystone is 43 deg 53
1/2 min, longitude 147 deg 9 min; that of Swilly 43 deg 54 min south,
longitude 147 deg 3 min east of Greenwich.

In the night the westerly wind, which had so long befriended us, died
away, and was succeeded by one from the north-east. When day appeared
we had lost sight of the land, and did not regain it until the 19th, at
only the distance of 17 leagues from our desired port. The wind was now
fair, the sky serene, though a little hazy, and the temperature of
the air delightfully pleasant: joy sparkled in every countenance, and
congratulations issued from every mouth. Ithaca itself was scarcely
more longed for by Ulysses, than Botany Bay by the adventurers who had
traversed so many thousand miles to take possession of it.

"Heavily in clouds came on the day" which ushered in our arrival. To us
it was "a great, an important day," though I hope the foundation, not
the fall, of an empire will be dated from it.