Near the mouth we again landed for half an hour, and found a cluster of three or four dome-shaped huts, large and roomy, of neat construction, covered with sheets of melaleuca bark, and having one, sometimes two entrances.  Some fishing nets, similar to those used at Moreton Bay, were seen.  The men retired into the bush when we landed, nor would they come out to me when I advanced alone towards them, in order to look at the huts.  We anchored for the night under Number 1 of the Barnard Isles.  Megapodii were here very plentiful, and about daylight very noisy, running about in all directions, repeating their loud call of chro-co—­chro-co.  Some of the bushes presented a fine show of the scarlet flowers of Disemma coccinea, a kind of passion-flower, before only found at Endeavour River by Sir Joseph Banks, during Cook’s first voyage.  In the morning we returned to the ship.

On June 12th, while passing a small opening in the land, a little to the northward of Double Point, the Asp was observed on shore with a signal for assistance, which was immediately sent, when she was got off without damage.  At this place, as Lieutenant Simpson informed me, a boomerang was obtained from the natives; we had not before observed this singular weapon upon the north-east coast, and its use is quite unknown on the north coast from Cape York to Port Essington.  This one too was painted green, a colour which I never heard of elsewhere among the Australians, whose pigments are black, white, yellow, and red.

Near this place, while tacking close in shore, a native dog was seen by Lieutenant Simpson, in chase of a small kangaroo, which, on being close pressed, plunged into the water and swam out to sea, when it was picked up by the boat, leaving its pursuer standing on a rock gazing wistfully at its intended prey, until a musket ball, which went very near its mark, sent it off at a trot.  The kangaroo lived on board for a few days, and proved to constitute quite a new kind, closely allied to Halmaturus thetidis.

FRANKLAND ISLES.

We anchored in the evening off the northern extreme of Frankland Isle, Number 4 about three quarters of a mile off shore.  At night a party was sent on shore to look for turtles, but, after remaining there for three hours, having walked several times round the island, they returned without having seen the slightest trace of these animals.

The Frankland Group consists of four islands, two of which are very small, and each of the other two (1 and 4) about a mile in length.  To these may or may not be added another high and much larger detached island situated about five miles to the North-West, about midway between the remainder of the group and the mainland.  Number 4 is formed of two wooded rocky eminences at its extremes, connected by level ground, consisting of dead coral and sand, thickly covered with trees at one part, and scattered bushes at another.  The low woody portion of this island is strewed with flat blocks of the same kind of recent coral conglomerate that occurs in situ on the beach, also with quantities of pumice twelve feet above high-water mark of spring tides.  There is little underwood, the trees overhead forming a shady grove.  Herbaceous plants are few in number—­of the others I shall only mention a wild nutmeg, Myristica cimicifera, not, however, of any commercial importance.