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Long Island Sound is an extensive gulf or channel, from three to twenty-five miles broad, and about one hundred and forty in length, extending the whole length of Long Island, and dividing it from Connecticut. It is narrow at the eastern entrance, and expands in the middle; it communicates with the ocean at both ends. Towards the west it contracts gradually, till it joins the harbor of New York by a narrow and crooked strait. It admits of a free navigation throughout its whole extent for the largest ships, except at the celebrated passage called Hell Gate,30 situated near the west end of this sound, about eight miles from the city of New York. It is a very singular strait, about three or four hundred yards in breadth, having a ledge of sunken rocks across it in an angular direction, which occasions many whirlpools and cross currents in the water. These, at certain periods of the tide, make a tremendous noise, and render a passage impracticable; but at other times the water is smooth, and the navigation easy.

Pamlico Sound is a kind of a lake or inland sea, from ten to thirty miles broad, and seventy miles in length. It is separated from the Atlantic ocean, in its whole length, by a beach of sand hardly a mile wide, generally covered with trees or bushes. Through this bank are several small inlets, by which boats may pass; but Ocrecock Inlet is the only one that will admit vessels of burden. This inlet communicates with Albemarle Sound, which is also a kind of inland sea, sixty miles in length, and from four to fifteen in breadth, lying north of Pamlico Sound. Core Sound lies south of Pamlico, and has a communication with it. These sounds are so large, when compared with their inlets from the sea, that no tide can be perceived in any of the rivers which empty into them, nor is the water salt, even in the mouths of these rivers.