They did not receive any extra pay, or promotion, or official
recognition. Neither did Bass, beyond Hunter's commendation in a
despatch. He wrote up his modest little diary, a terse record of
observations and occurrences, and got ready for the next adventure.

We will follow him on this one.

On the evening of Sunday, December 3, 1797, at six o'clock, Bass's men
rowed out of Port Jackson heads and turned south. The night was spent in
Little Bay, three miles north of Botany Bay, as Bass did not deem it
prudent to proceed further in the darkness, the weather having become
cloudy and uncertain, and things not having yet found their proper place
in the boat. Nor was very much progress made on the 4th, for a violent
wind was encountered, which caused Bass to make for Port Hacking. On the
following day, "the wind headed in flurries," and the boat did not get
further than Providential Cove, or Watta-mowley, where the Tom Thumb had
taken refuge in the previous year. On the 7th, Bass reached Shoalhaven,
which he named. He remained there three days, and described the soil and
situation with some care. "The country around it is generally low and
swampy and the soil for the most part is rich and good, but seemingly
much subject to extensive inundation." One sentence of comment reads
curiously now that the district is linked up by railway with Sydney, and
exports its butter and other produce to the markets of Europe. "However
capable much of the soil of this country might upon a more accurate
investigation be found to be of agricultural improvement, certain it is
that the difficulty of shipping off the produce must ever remain a bar to
its colonisation. A nursery of cattle might perhaps be carried on here
with advantage, and that sort of produce ships off itself." Bass, a
farmer's son, reared in an agricultural centre, was a capable judge of
good country, but of course there was nothing when he saw these rich