those in the cliffs near Hat Hill. The port was named after His
Excellency governor HUNTER; and a settlement, called _New Castle_, has
lately been there established. The entrance is narrow, and the deepest
water (about three fathoms) close to the north-west side of the Coal
Island; but no vessel of more than three hundred tons should attempt it.

[* Afterwards captain of the _Junon_. He was mortally wounded, whilst
bravely defending his Majesty's frigate against a vastly superior force;
and died at _Guadaloupe_.]

BASS. 1797.

In December, Mr. GEORGE BASS obtained leave to make an expedition to the
southward; and he was furnished with a fine whale boat and six weeks
provisions by the governor, and a crew of six seamen from the ships. He
sailed Dec. 3., in the evening; but foul and strong winds forced him into
_Port Hacking_ and _Watta-Mowlee_. On the 5th, in latitude 34 deg. 38', he
was obliged to stop in a small bight of the coast, a little south of
_Alowrie_. The points of land there are basaltic; and on looking round
amongst the burnt rocks scattered over a hollowed circular space behind
the shore, Mr. Bass found a hole of twenty-five or thirty feet in
diameter; into which the sea washed up by a subterraneous passage.

Dec. 6., he passed a long sloping projection which I have called _Point
Bass_, lying about three leagues south of Alowrie. Beyond this point, the
coast forms a sandy bay of four or five leagues in length, containing two
small inlets; and the southernmost being accessible to the boat, Mr. Bass
went in and stopped three days. This little place was found to deserve no
better name than _Shoals Haven_. The entrance is mostly choaked up by
sand, and the inner part with banks of sand and mud; there is, however, a
small channel sufficiently deep for boats. The latitude was made to be
34 deg. 52' south; the sloping Point Bass, to the northward, bore N. 12 deg. E.,
and a steep head at the southern extremity of the bay, S. 35 deg. E. The tide
was found to rise seven or eight feet, and the time of high water to be
about _eight hours and a half after_ the moon passed over the meridian.

The great chain of high land, called the Blue Mountains, by which the
colony at Port Jackson is prevented from extending itself to the west,
appeared to Mr. Bass to terminate here, near the sea coast. The base of
this southern extremity of the chain, he judged to extend twenty-five or
thirty miles, in a south-western direction fr