Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia — Vol. 2 / Performed between the years 1818 and 1822

by Philip Parker King

(*Footnote. See hereafter.)

In the vicinity of Cambridge Gulf, Captain King states, the character of the country is entirely changed; and irregular ranges of detached rocky hills composed of sandstone, rising abruptly from extensive plains of low level land, supersede the low and woody coast, that occupies almost uninterruptedly the space between this inlet and Cape Wessel, a distance of more than six hundred miles. Cambridge Gulf, which is nothing more than a swampy arm of the sea, extends to about eighty miles inland, in a southern direction: and all the specimens from its vicinity precisely resemble the older sandstones of the confines of England and Wales.* The View (volume 1 plate) represents in the distance Mount Cockburn, at the head of Cambridge Gulf; the flat rocky top of which was supposed to consist of sandstone, but has also the aspect of the trap-formation. The strata in Lacrosse Island, at the entrance of the Gulf, rise toward the north-west, at an angle of about 30 degrees with the horizon: their direction consequently being from north-east to south-west.

(*Footnote. I use the term Old Red Sand Stone, in the acceptation of Messrs. Buckland and Conybeare, Observations on the South Western Coal District of England. Geological Transactions Second Series volume 1. Captain King's specimens from Lacrosse Island are not to be distinguished from the slaty strata of that formation, in the banks of the Avon, about two miles below Clifton.)

From hence to Cape Londonderry, towards the south, is an uniform coast of moderate elevation; and from that point to Cape Leveque, although the outline may be in a general view considered as ranging from north-east to south-west,* the coast is remarkably indented, and the adjoining sea irregularly studded with very numerous islands. The specimens from this tract consist almost entirely of sandstone, resembling that of Cambridge Gulf, Goulburn Island, and the Gulf of Carpentaria; with which the trap-formation appears to be associated.

(*Footnote. The large chart Sheet 5 best shows the general range of the shore, from the islands filling up the inlets.)

York Sound, one of the principal inlets on this part of the coast, is bounded by precipitous rocks, from one to two hundred feet in height; and some conical rocky peaks, which not improbably consist of quartz-rock, were noticed on the eastern side of the entrance. An unpublished sketch, by Captain King, shows that the banks of Hunter's River, one of the branches of York Sound, at seven or eight miles from its opening, are composed of sandstone, in beds of great regularity; and this place is also remarkable for a copious spring of fresh water, one of the rarest phenomena of these thirsty and inhospitable shores.*

(*Footnote. Narrative 1.)

The most considerable inlet, however, which has yet been discovered in this quarter of Australia, is Prince Regent's River, about thirty miles to the south-west of York Sound, the course of which is almost rectilinear for about fifty miles in a south-eastern direction; a fact which will probably be found to be connected with the geological structure of the country. The general character of the banks, which are lofty and abrupt, is precisely the same with that of the rivers falling into York Sound; and the level of the country does not appear to be higher in the interior than near the coast. The banks are from two to four hundred feet in height, and consist of close-grained siliceous sandstone, of a reddish hue;* and the view (Plate above) shows that the beds are nearly horizontal, and very regularly disposed; the cascade there represented being about one hundred and sixty feet in height, and the beds from six to twelve feet in thickness. Two conspicuous hills, which Captain King has named Mounts Trafalgar and Waterloo, on the north-east of Prince-Regent's River, not far from its entrance, are remarkable for cap-like summits, much resembling those which characterize the trap formation. (Sketch 3.)

(*Footnote. Narrative 1 and 2.)

The coast on the south of this remarkable river, to Cape Leveque, has not yet been thoroughly examined; but it appears from Captain King's Chart (Number 5) to be intersected by several inlets of considerable size, to trace which to their termination is still a point of great interest in the physical geography of New Holland. The space thus left to be explored, from the Champagny Isles to Cape Leveque, corresponds to more than one hundred miles in a direct line; within which extent nothing but islands and detached portions of land have yet been observed. One large inlet especially, on the south-east of Cape Leveque, appears to afford considerable promise of a river; and the rise of the tide within the Buccaneer's Archipelago, where there is another unexplored opening, is no less than thirty-seven feet.