being
to touch at Queen Charlotte's Sound, to refresh my crew, and put the ship
in a condition to encounter the southern latitudes.

On the 17th, at day-break, we saw Mount Egmont, which was covered with
everlasting snow, bearing S.E. 1/2 E. Our distance from the shore was about
eight leagues, and, on sounding, we found seventy fathoms water, a muddy
bottom. The wind soon fixed in the western board, and blew a fresh gale,
with which we steered S.S.E. for Queen Charlotte's Sound, with a view of
falling in with Cape Stephens. At noon Cape Egmont bore E.N.E. distant
three or four leagues; and though the mount was hid in the clouds, we
judged it to be in the same direction as the Cape; latitude observed 39 deg.
24'. The wind increased in such a manner as to oblige us to close-reef our
top-sails, and strike top-gallant yards. At last we could bear no more sail
than the two courses, and two close-reefed top-sails; and under them we
stretched for Cape Stephens, which we made at eleven o'clock at night.

At midnight we tacked and made a trip to the north till three o'clock next
morning, when we bore away for the sound. At nine we hauled round Point
Jackson through a sea which looked terrible, occasioned by a rapid tide,
and a high wind; but as we knew the coast, it did not alarm us. At eleven
o'clock we anchored before Ship Cove; the strong flurries from off the land
not permitting us to get in.

In the afternoon, as we could not move the ship, I went into the Cove, with
the seine, to try to catch some fish. The first thing I did after landing,
was to look for the bottle I left hid when last there, in which was the
memorandum. It was taken away, but by whom it did not appear. Two hauls
with the seine producing only four small fish, we, in some measure, made up
for this deficiency, by shooting several birds, which the flowers in the
garden had drawn thither, as also some old shags, and by robbing the nests
of some young ones.

Being little wind next morning, we weighed and warped the ship into the
Cove, and there moored with the two bowers. We unbent the sails to repair
them; several having been split, and otherwise damaged in the late gale.
The main and fore courses, already worn to the very utmost, were condemned
as useless. I ordered the top-masts to be struck and unrigged, in order to
fix to them moveable chocks or knees, for want of which the trestle-trees
were continually breaking; the forge to be set up, to make bolts