On the 12th, we fell in with two more small islands, which were covered with green trees, but appeared to be uninhabited. We were close in with the southermost, which proved to be a slip of land in the form of a half moon, low, flat, and sandy: from the south end of it a reef runs out to the distance of about half a mile, on which the sea breakswith great fury. We found no anchorage, but the boat landed. It had a pleasant appearance, but afforded neither vegetables nor water; there were however many birds upon it, so tame that they suffered themselves to be taken by hand. The other island very much resembles this, and is distant from it about five or six leagues: they lie W.N.W. and E.S.E. of each other. One of them is in latitude 20° 3° S., longitude 146° W.; the other 20° 3° S., longitude 146° 15'W. and we called them the DUKE OF GLOUCESTER' S ISLANDS; the variation here is five degrees east. These islands are probably the land seen by Quiros, as the situation is nearly the same; but if not, the land he saw could not be more considerable: whatever it was we went to the southward of it, and the long billows we had here convinced us that there was no land near us in that direction. The wind here being to the eastward, I hauled to the southward again, and the next day, Monday the 13th, in the evening, as we were steering W.S.W. we observed that we lost the long southerly billows, and that we got them again at seven o'clock the next day. When we lost them we were in latitude 21° ° S., longitude 147° 4'W. and when we got them again we were in latitude 21° 4° S., longitude 149° 48'W. so that I imagine there was then some land to the southward, not far distant.

* There is another island of this name, among those that were discovered by Captain Wallis.

Voyaging Accounts