Page 277

Joseph Banks's Descriptions of Places

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New South Wales (continued) where we had an opportunity of haling the Seine we generaly caught from 50 to 200 lb of fish in a tide. There sorts were various, none I think but Mullets known in Europe; in general however they were sufficiently palatable and some very delicate food; the Sting rays indeed which were caught on the Southern part of the coast were very coarse, but there little else was caught so we were obligd to comfort ourselves with the comforts of Plenty and enjoy more pleasure in Satiety than in eating. To the Northward again when we came to be entangled within the great Reef (within which we saild to our knowledge 0 Leages and we knew not how many more, perplexd every moment with shoals) was a plenty of Turtle hardly to be credited, every shoal swarmd with them. The weather indeed was generaly so boisterous that our boats could not row after them so fast as they could swim, so that we got but few, but they were excellent and so large that a single Turtle always servd the ship. Had we been there either at the time of Laying or the more Voyaging Accounts © Derived from State Library of NSW Transcription of Banks's Journal page (vol. 2) *273, February 2004 Published by kind permission of the Library To cite this page use: https://paulturnbull.org/project/southseas/journals/-banks_remarks-277.html