With all papers necessary to prove his identity and his dearly-loved
journals and charts on board, Flinders bade farewell to his trusty friend
King, and on September 21st, 1803, the three vessels, the lumbering
_Rolla_ and the two midgets of schooners, put to sea. Before midnight,
just after leaving Port Jackson, the three ships were flying before a
south-easterly gale, and the _Cumberland_ was reduced to a close-reefed
mainsail and jib, and she was so exceedingly crank that Flinders
considered it was not safe to run her even in a double-reefed topsail
breeze. Then, in spite of her recent repairs, she leaked like a basket,
and after an hour and a half's cessation from pumping the water was awash
on the cabin floor. But nevertheless she was more weatherly than either
the _Rolla_ or _Francis_, for in working to windward at night-time
Flinders would have to run down four miles or so in the morning to join
them, although they carried all the sail they possibly could.

A fortnight later they arrived at Wreck Reef, and when Flinders sent King
an account of the trip down, he gave the Governor some idea of the
discomforts experienced. He wrote in a humorous vein:--

"Of all the filthy little things I ever saw, this schooner, for
bugs, lice, fleas, weevils, mosquitos, cockroaches, large and
small, and mice, rises superior to them all.... I have never
stripped myself before the last two nights, but usually slept upon
the lee locker with my clothes on.... I believe that I, as well as
my clothes, must undergo a good boiling in the large kettle."

In the evening of the 7th October the three vessels anchored under the lee
of Wreck Island, to the great joy of its tenants, and as soon as Flinders
landed on the bank they gave him three cheers and fired a salute from the
carronades saved from the wreck. The _Porpoise_ still held together, and