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inches long. Legs and feet like a chicken. Presumably fat & good, plenty of pidgeons, & white fowl. Something like the Guinea hen, with a very strong thick & sharp pointed bill of a red colour. Stout legs & claws. I believe they are carniverous they hold their food between the thumb or hind claw & the bottom of the foot. Lift it to the mouth without stooping so much as a parrot. Some of them have a few blue feathers on the wing. There is also a web footed fowl in general of a deep blue. Its bill 2 inches long - Straight but suddnely with downwards at the end. Very sharp & strong... Its tail 3 inches long. It does not [indecipherable] form for a long flight having only six long feathers in the wing. Its breast is covered with very thick & long down which grows from the tips of very strong feathers with which the whole breast & belly is coverd [covered]. Its length from tip of bill to tip of tail 22 inches. The extent of its wings from tip to tip 25 inches. [Like?] from them burrowing in holes like rabbits. The bay abounds with a variety of excellent fish.. as 2 o'clock in the afternoon. We took [indecipherable] of this island in the name of [Her Brilliance?] Majesty & [indecipherable] the English colours & M Ball named the different parts of the island. The two mountains. Mount Gower & Mount [Lidgbird?] the valley between them [Erstine?] Valley. A large bay near the middle of the island Prince William Henry Bay. Two other bays to the left of it Hunter Bay & [Cullan?] Bay. & an island in the middle of Prince William Bay Blackburn Isle. Had I been present at this ceremony it should have been named Knight Island. We took on board 18 turtle of near 500 pounds weight each & next morning [pick?] to sea & [indecipherable] our course for Port Jackson about 13 miles in a SE direction from [indecipherable] Island. Hands a beautifull [beautiful] [pyramid?] them which is I think a mile or more perpendicular height. Not more than 3/4 of a mile base. To this [m?] Ball has given the name of Balls Pyramid. The island lays in 31..36 South Latitute & 159.04 East Longitude & is 389 miles from Port Jackson. [Indecipherable] [Wellrie?] on the 20th of March - We have since been at Howe Island but found no turtle. The winter being too far [indecipherable] they are gone to the north into a warmer climate. I believe it will be November before they return with [indecipherable] to this country. I am really at a loss my friend what to say. It is true we know but little of it but I believe it is the general opinion that it will be a number of years before the mother country [indecipherable] advantage from it [indecipherable] to the expense of maintaining a colony on it. What little we have seen of it is rocky. [Indecipherable] [indecipherable] there is [indecipherable] space of [clear?] ground where the soil in general is a black [mouth?] mix with sand. It produces no wood that we have [indecipherable] fit for shipb building. The trees grow to be great height & size. But most are hollow or decay in the heart & the best when sawn into planks are short & brittle. We have never found any fruit except a small berry. Something like