We passed over it at high water without knowing our danger, for the stream of the tide carried us through the deepest part of the channel.
BATHURST ISLAND is from thirty to thirty-three miles in extent, having a circumference of a hundred and twenty miles.

GORDON BAY, on its western side, affords a good shelter in the easterly monsoon; it is ten miles wide, and six deep, and terminated by PORT HURD, the entrance to which is fronted by a bar, having twelve or fourteen feet on it at low water.

Near the south-western head of the bay two projecting cliffy points (Twin Cliffs) terminate a sandy bay, from which wood and, probably, water may be obtained.
PORT HURD, at the bottom of Gordon Bay, in latitude 11 degrees 39 minutes 30 seconds, is a mere salt-water inlet, running up in a South-East direction for eight miles; it then separates into two creeks that wind under each side of a wooded hill; the entrance is three-quarters of a mile wide, and formed by two low points.

At the back of the port are some wooded hills; one of them, Mount Hurd, kept in the opening between the two points of entrance, is the mark for the deepest part of the bar.

When within the entrance the port opens, and forms a basin two miles and a quarter broad, after which it narrows and runs up at from half to a quarter of a mile wide, with a channel four and five fathoms deep.
The country here is thickly wooded, but very low, excepting a few ranges of hills that may rise to the height of two hundred feet.