CAUTION TO MARINERS.

New Zealand Colonist and Port Nicholson Advertiser, Volume I, Issue 64, 10 March 1843, Page 2

CAUTION TO MARINERS.

Important Discoveries. —The Pearl, arrived in the Downs from China, reports, on her voyage from Sydney to Manilla, having, on the 24th September, discovered an island not laid down in the charts; it lies in lat. 21, 59 S., long, (by good chronometers) 168, 30 E. ; it is a fine-looking island, well wooded, with cocoa nut trees close to the beach. At noon we were within three miles of the east point, which is in the middle of the island; off the point a reef projects about a mile to seaward ; it stretches in a N. by E. direction 20 to 25 miles ; the captain, supposing it to be a new discovery, named in Burrow’s Island. Two days after, we made the island of Erromanga, which proved the chronometers to be correct. After we got to the northward of the N.E. point, we saw land stretching a great distance to the N.W.; it appeared to be detached from the first island, but night coming on, we could not ascertain. On the 4th of April, in sailing down the China Sea, we observed the bottom quite plain; we sounded in nine fathoms, and found the bottom to be coral; this bank is not laid down in a ehart of 1840 ; the bank is in lat. 7, 36 N., long. 111, 28 E., by two good chronometers, and lunar taken the day before. Although we had nine fathoms water, there may be less in some parts, and requires a good look-out in this part of the China Sea.