He approached the Northern Territory by ship, and his choice of site was influenced by the navigability of the river. He traversed a strait between Elcho Island and the mainland, which Matthew Flinders had previously noted as a "probable island". The strait is now known as Cadell Strait. He had been able to give the authorities much valuable information about the country, but the climate of the territory and its great distance from other centres of population made its development a problem which had still not been solved more than half a century after his visit.