CHAPTER XVII.

EARLY AUSTRALASIAN DISCOVERIES.

PORTUGUESE AND DUTCH DISCOVERIES OF AUSTRALIA-TASMANENGLISH VOYAGERS-DAMPIER IN AUSTRALIA-CAPTAIN COOK IN NEW ZEALAND AND AUSTRALIA-FRENCH EXPEDITIONS.

[1601-1788.]

USTRALIA, a vast island more than threequarters of the size of Europe, and only the largest of a numerous group which with it, in pre-historic times and before it was the sport of volcanic action, seems to have formed one vast southern continent, was first visited among Europeans by some Portuguese voyagers early in the sixteenth century. The nearer regions of the East Indies, however, then proved more attractive; and no distinct effort to explore it appears to have been made till after 1601, when it was again seen by another Portuguese, named Godinho de Heredia, and then the effort was not made by Portuguese but by DutchChiefly by them it was often reached, and its most accessible parts, as well as the adjoining islands, were gradually explored during the eighteenth century. Tasman's expeditions, sent out under the direction of Anthony Van Dieman in 1642 and 1644, being the most famous and fruitful of all. Tasman first discovered the island which, now known by his name, was formerly called Van Dieman's Land, in honour of his employer. Then he traversed the

men.

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northern shore of Australia or New Holland. Others of his race carried on the work of exploration; but still the voyages of discovery failed to issue in colonization; and after the close of the eighteenth century the Dutch resigned the quest, as the Portuguese had done before them.

The English, who had not before been altogether idle, then succeeded to the enterprise. William Dampier, who began his seaman's life as a buccaneer in the West Indies, was the first of our nation to engage in it. In 1688 he visited the north-western part of Australia, of which he gave an unfavourable report. "It was only low and sandy ground, the points only excepted, which are rocky, as some isles in the bay. This part had no fresh water, except what was dug, but divers sorts of trees, and among the rest the dragon-tree, which produces the gum called dragon's-blood. We saw neither fruit-trees, nor so much as the track of any living being of the bigness of a large mastiff dog; some few land-birds, but none larger than a blackbird, and scarcely any water-fowl. The inhabitants are the most miserable wretches in the universe, having no houses, nor garments, except a piece of the bark of a tree, tied like a girdle round the waist; no sheep, poultry, or fruits. They feed upon a few fish, cockles, mussels, and periwinkles. They are without religion or government. They are tall, straight-bodied, and thin, with small, long limbs. They have great round foreheads and great brows. Their eyelids are always half closed to keep the flies out of their eyes, they being so troublesome here that no fanning will keep them from coming to one's face. So that, from their

infancy being thus annoyed with these insects, they do never open their eyes as other people do; and, therefore, they cannot see far, unless they hold up their heads. They are long visaged, and of an unpleasing aspect, having no graceful feature in their faces. The colour of their skin, both of their faces and the rest of their body, is coal black, like that of the negroes of Guinea. They live in companies, twenty or thirty men, women, and children together. Their only food is a sort of small fish, which they get by making weirs of stones across little coves or branches of the sea, every tide bringing in the small fish, and there leaving them for a prey to these people, who constantly attend to search for them at low water."

"1

Dampier went to Australian waters again, and made some further explorations, in 1699, though his chief visit was paid to the same western districts to which he had gone before. Except for the pleasure of discovering the barrenest spot on the face of the globe, he said, his achievements in New Holland would not have charmed him much.2 He then sailed north, explored New Guinea, and discovered New Britain.

His dismal account of these regions helped to deter other voyagers from following in his track. Nothing memorable was done till 1769, when Captain Cook, proceeding from Otaheite in his famous voyage round the world, reached the south-eastern side of New Zealand, and established some intimacy with its bold natives. His friendly advances being at first rejected, he killed four and captured two of them, thus beginning

1 Howitt, "History of Discovery in Australia, Tasmania, and New Zealand," vol. i. pp. 66, 67.

2 Howitt, vol. i. p. 72.

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a strife still fruitful in misfortune both to Englishmen and to Maories. Through his captives, however, whom he treated kindly, he and some of his party afterwards were able to land, and had the first English experience of New Zealand life. "They entered some of their huts and saw them at their meals. Their huts were very slight, and generally placed ten or fifteen together. They found them generally dining on fish, and eating to it the bruised and roasted roots of fern. This was in October. In the more advanced season they understood that they had plenty of excellent vegetables; but they saw no animals except dogs. They found both men and women painted with red ochre and oil, but the women much the most so; and, like the South Sea Islanders, they saluted by touching noses. They wore petticoats of native cloth, made from the New Zealand flax, and a sort of cloak or mantle of a much coarser kind. They found them more modest in manner and more cleanly in their homes than the Otaheitians. They bartered their cloth and war-weapons for European cloth; but nails they set no value on, having as yet evidently no knowledge of iron and its uses. What astonished the English greatly was to find boys whipping tops exactly like those of Europe. They found some houses larger and more strongly built than those on the shore. They measured one canoe, made out of the lobes of three trees, which was 68 feet long, 5 wide, and 3 high. These, as well as their houses, were much adorned with carvings, in which they seemed to prefer spiral lines and distorted faces."1

With other New Zealanders, as he sailed along the 1 Howitt, vol. i. pp. 81, 82.

south-east coast, Captain Cook attempted to have friendly dealings; but his attempts generally ended in quarrel and bloodshed, both then and in the whole of his voyage right round the New Zealand group. Meaning well, he and his party acted with rashness and severity, which have had deplorable results in later times, whereas more forbearance might have been attended with the best consequences. "Without measuring the past by the present standard," says one who had access to native traditions, "the savage New Zealanders on several occasions acted as civilized men, and the Christians like savages. Lieutenant Gore fired from the ship's deck at a New Zealander in a cance, who had defrauded him of a piece of calico. In the excitement of paddling to escape, the injury done by the musket was not noticed by the natives in the canoe, although detected by Lieutenant Gore from the ship's deck, as Maru-tu-ahua, the man shot, scarcely altered his position. When the canoe reached the shore, the natives found their comrade sitting dead on the stolen calico, which was stained with his life's blood, the ball having entered his back. Several chiefs investigated into the affair, and declared that Maru-tu-ahua deserved his fate; that he stole and was killed for so doing, and that his life blood should not be revenged on the strangers. Seeing, however, Maru-tu-ahua had paid for the calico with his life, it was not taken away from him, but was wrapped round his body as a winding-sheet. Singular to relate, Captain Cook landed soon after the murder, and traded as if nothing had occurred. Would Cook's ship's crew have acted thus if one of them had been slain?"

1 Thomson, "The Story of New Zealand," vol. i. p. 231.