This day the 15th Of July We set sail in the morning with the land-wind...
This day the 1st of September at noon we were in 29° 16' Southern Latitude [*], with a variable wind, so that we found it impossible to get to eastward.
[* The ship had already sailed farther south than Houtman's Abrolhos.]
On the 2nd do. the wind went round to the north with a top-gallant gale; at noon we were in 30° 16' S.L. and found we had drifted a long way to southward; in the evening the wind turned to the north-west; course held N.E. by north.
On the 3rd do. in the morning the wind was blowing from the west; we saw a good deal of rock-weed floating about and also a number of cuttle-bones. We therefore turned our course to eastward, and at noon we saw the mainland of the South-land, extending N.N.W. and S.S.E.; we were at about 3 miles' distance from it and saw the land extending southward for 4 miles by estimation, where it was bounded by the horizon. We sounded here in 25 fathom, fine sandy bottom. It is a treeless, barren coast with a few sandy dunes, the same as to northward; we were in 29° 16' Southern Latitude, turned our course to north-west, the wind being W.S.W., but the hollow seas threw us close to the land, so that in the evening we had to drop anchor at one mile's distance from it; at two glasses in the first watch our anchor was broken in two, so that we had to bring out another in great haste.
On the 4th do. in the morning the wind was S.W. by S., still with a very hollow swell. During the day the wind went round to S.S.W., upon which we weighed anchor and got under sail before noon. We stood out to sea on a W.N.W. course in order to get off the lee-shore. At noon we were in 28° 50' S.L., where the land began to fall off one point, to wit North by west and South by east. In the afternoon the wind went round to the south, and we shaped our course westward. Towards evening we became aware of a shoal straight ahead or west of us, at only a musket-shot's distance, we being in 25 fathom fine sandy bottom. We turned the rudder and ran off it half a mile to E.S.E., where we came to anchor in 27 fathom fine bottom; from noon till the evening we had been sailing on a W.N.W. course, and we were now at 5 miles' distance from the mainland. In the night it fell a dead calm with fine weather and a south-by-east wind.
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On the 5th do. in the morning the wind being S.S.E. with lovely weather, we weighed anchor and sailed S.S.W. for an hour, at the end of which we observed more breakers, shallows and islets ahead of us and alongside our course; the wind then turned more to eastward, so that we could run to the south and S.S.E. This reef or shoal extended S.S.W. and N.N.E.; along it we sounded in 27, 28 and 29 fathom sandy bottom; at 11 o'clock in the forenoon we had lost sight of the mainland; at noon we were in 28° 59' S. Lat., the extremity of the reef lying W.S.W. of us, and we being in 50 or 60 fathom, foul steep bottom. In the afternoon the wind began to abate, but the current carried us to the west, while the rocks here fell off far to westward, we being at about 87 miles' distance from the mainland by estimation. We had a dead calm the whole night and drifted along the rock, on which we heard the waves break the whole time.
On the 6th do. in the morning we had lost sight of the rocks; about 10 o'clock the wind began to blow from the W.N.W., so that we ran nearly in the direction of the rocks. At noon we were in 28° 44' S. Lat.; it began to blow hard from the N.W., so that in the afternoon we kept tacking off and on, and found ourselves carried northward by the current. In the evening we stood out to sea away from the rocks again, and sounded in 40 fathom foul rocky bottom; this shallow here extends seaward S.E. and N.W. In the evening it began to blow very hard, so that we had to run on with shortened mainsails, the wind being variable.
On the 7th do. in the morning the wind abated, so that we made sail again; at noon we found our latitude to be 29° 30'; we went over to northward to get sight of the mainland again, but the wind suddenly turned sharply to W.N.W., so that we had to stand out to sea again.