IV.

As the voyages of discovery, undertaken by his Majesty’s command, have facilitated the access of ships into the Pacific Ocean, they have also greatly enlarged our knowledge of its contents.

Though the immense expanse usually distinguished by this appellation, had been navigated by Europeans for near two centuries and a half [10] , by far the greater part of it, particularly to the south of the equator, had remained, during all this time, unexplored.

The great aim of Magalhaens, and of the Spaniards in general, its first navigators being merely to arrive, by this passage, at the Moluccas, and the other Asiatic Spice Islands, every intermediate part of the ocean that did not lie contiguous to their western track, which was on the north side of the equator, of course escaped due examination; and if Mendana and Quiros, and some nameless conductors of voyages before them [11] , by deviating from this track, and holding a westerly one from Callao, within the southern tropic, were so fortunate as to meet with various islands there, and so sanguine as to consider those islands as marks of the existence of a neighbouring southern continent; in the exploring of which they flattered themselves they should rival the fame of De Gama and Columbus; these feeble efforts never led to any effectual disclosure of the supposed hidden mine of the New World. On the contrary, their voyages being conducted without a judicious plan, and their discoveries being left imperfect without immediate settlement, or subsequent examination, and scarcely recorded in any well-authenticated or accurate narrations, had been almost forgot; or were so obscurely remembered, as only to serve the purpose of producing perplexing debates about their situation and extent; if not to suggest doubts about their very existence.

It seems, indeed, to have become a very early object of policy in the Spanish councils, to discontinue and to discourage any farther researches in that quarter. Already masters of a larger empire on the continent of America than they could conveniently govern, and of richer mines of the precious metals on that continent than they could convert into use, neither avarice nor ambition furnished reasons for aiming at a fresh accession of dominions. And thus, though settled all along the shores of this ocean, in a situation so commodious for prosecuting discoveries throughout its wide extent, the Spaniards remained satisfied with a coasting intercourse between their own ports; never stretching across the vast gulph that separates that part of America from Asia, but in an unvarying line of navigation; perhaps in a single annual ship, between Acapulco and Manilla.

The tracks of other European navigators of the South Pacific Ocean, were, in a great measure, regulated by those of the Spaniards; and consequently limited within the same narrow bounds. With the exception, perhaps, of two instances only, those of Le Maire and Roggewein, no ships of another nation had entered this sea, through the Strait of Magalhaens, or round Cape Horn, but for the purposes of clandestine trade with the Spaniards, or of open hostility against them: purposes which could not be answered, without precluding any probable chance of adding much to our stock of discovery. For it was obviously incumbent on all such adventurers, to confine their cruises within a moderate distance of the Spanish settlements; in the vicinity of which alone they could hope to exercise their commerce, or to execute their predatory and military operations. Accordingly, soon after emerging from the Strait, or completing the circuit of Tierra del Fuego, they began to hold a northerly course, to the uninhabited island of Juan Fernandez, their usual spot of rendezvous and refreshment. And, after ranging along the continent of America, from Chili to California, they either reversed their course back to the Atlantic; or, if they ventured to extend their voyage, by stretching over to Asia, they never thought of trying experiments in the unfrequented and unexplored parts of the ocean; but chose the beaten path (if the expression may be used), within the limits of which it was likely they might meet with a Philippine galleon, to make their voyage profitable to themselves; but could have little prospect, if they had been desirous, of making it useful to the world, by gaining any accession of new land to the map of the world.

By the natural operation of these causes, it could not but happen, that little progress should be made toward obtaining a full and accurate knowledge of the South Pacific Ocean. Something, however, had been attempted by the industrious and once enterprising Dutch; to whom we are indebted for three voyages, undertaken for the purposes of discovery; and whose researches, in the southern latitudes of this ocean, are much better ascertained than are those of the earlier Spanish navigators above mentioned.

Le Maire and Schouten, in 1616, and Roggewein, in 1722, wisely judging, that nothing new could be gained by adhering to the usual passage on the north side of the line, traversed this ocean from Cape Horn to the East Indies, crossing the South tropic; a space which had been so seldom, and so ineffectually visited; though popular belief, fortified by philosophical speculation, expected there to reap the richest harvest of discovery.

Tasman, in 1642, in his extensive circuit from Batavia, through the South Indian Ocean, entered the South Pacific, at its greatest distance from the American side, where it never had been examined before. And his range continued from a high Southern latitude, Northward to New Guinea, and the islands to the East of it, near the equator, produced intermediate discoveries, that have rendered his voyage memorable in the annals of navigation.

But still, upon the whole, what was effected in these three expeditions, served only to show how large a field was reserved for future and more persevering examination. Their results had, indeed, enabled geographers to diversify the vacant uniformity of former charts of this Ocean, by the insertion of some new islands. But the number, and the extent of these insertions were so inconsiderable, that they may be said to appear,

Rari, nantes in gurgite vasto.

And if the discoveries were few, those few were made very imperfectly. Some coasts were approached but not landed upon; and passed without waiting to examine their extent and connection with those that might exist at no great distance. If others were landed upon, the visits were, in general, so transient, that it was scarcely possible to build upon a foundation so weakly laid, any information that could even gratify idle curiosity; much less satisfy philosophical inquiry, or contribute greatly to the safety, or to the success of future navigation.

Let us, however, do justice to these beginnings of discovery. To the Dutch, we must, at least ascribe the merit of being our harbingers, though we afterward went beyond them in the road they had first ventured to tread. And with what success his Majesty’s ships have, in their repeated voyages, penetrated into the obscurest recesses of the South Pacific Ocean, will appear from the following enumeration of their various and very extensive operations, which have drawn up the veil that had hitherto been thrown over the geography of so great a proportion of the globe.

1. The several lands, of which any account had been given, as seen by any of the preceding navigators, Spanish or Dutch, have been carefully looked for; and most of them (at least such as seemed to be of any consequence) found out and visited; and not visited in a cursory manner, but every means used to correct former mistakes, and to supply former deficiencies, by making accurate inquiries ashore, and taking skilful surveys of their coasts, by sailing round them. Who has not heard, or read, of the boasted Tierra Australia del Espiritu Santo of Quiros? But its bold pretensions to be a part of a southern continent, could not stand Captain Cook’s examination, who sailed round it, and assigned it its true position and moderate bounds, in the Archipelago of the New Hebrides. [12]

2. Besides perfecting many of the discoveries of their predecessors, our late navigators have enriched geographical knowledge with a long catalogue of their own. The Pacific Ocean, within the South tropic, repeatedly traversed, in every direction, was found to swarm with a seemingly endless profusion of habitable spots of land. Islands, scattered through the amazing space of near fourscore degrees of longitude, separated at various distances, or grouped in numerous clusters, have, at their approach, as it were, started into existence; and such ample accounts have been brought home concerning them and their inhabitants, as may serve every useful purpose of inquiry; and, to use Captain Cook’s words, who bore so considerable a share in those discoveries, have left little more to be done in that part. [13]

3. Byron, Wallis, and Carteret, had each of them contributed toward increasing our knowledge of the islands that exist in the Pacific Ocean, within the limits of the southern tropic; but how far that ocean reached to the west, what lands bounded it on that side, and the connection of those lands with the discoveries of former navigators, was still the reproach of geographers, and remained absolutely unknown, till Captain Cook, during his first voyage in 1770 [14] , brought back the most satisfactory decision of this important question. With a wonderful perseverance, and consummate skill, amidst an uncommon combination of perplexities and dangers, he traced this coast near two thousand miles from the 38° of South latitude, cross the tropic, to its northern extremity, within 101⁄2° of the equinoctial, where it was found to join the lands already explored by the Dutch, in several voyages from their Asiatic settlements, and to which they have given the name of New Holland. Those discoveries made in the last century, before Tasman’s voyage, had traced the north and the west coasts of this land; and Captain Cook, by his extensive operations on its east side, left little to be done toward completing the full circuit of it. Between Cape Hicks, in latitude 38°, where his examination of this coast began, and that part of Van Diemen’s Land, from whence Tasman took his departure, was not above fifty-five leagues. It was highly probable, therefore, that they were connected; though Captain Cook cautiously says, that he could not determine whether his New South Wales, that is, the East Coast of New Holland, joins to Van Diemen’s Land, or no. [15] But what was thus left undetermined by the operations of his first voyage, was, in the course of his second, soon cleared up; Captain Furneaux, in the Adventure, during his separation from the Resolution (a fortunate separation as it thus turned out) in 1773, having explored Van Diemen’s Land, from its southern point, along the east coast, far beyond Tasman’s station, and on to the latitude 38°, where Captain Cook’s examination of it in 1770 had commenced. [16]

It is no longer, therefore, a doubt, that we have now a full knowledge of the whole circumference of this vast body of land, this fifth part of the world (if I may so speak), which our late voyages have discovered to be of so amazing a magnitude, that, to use Captain Cook’s words, it is of a larger extent than any other country in the known world, that does not bear the name of a continent. [17]

4. Tasman having entered the Pacific Ocean, after leaving Van Diemen’s Land, had fallen in with a coast to which he gave the name of New Zealand. The extent of this coast, and its position in any direction but a part of its west side, which he sailed along in his course northward, being left absolutely unknown, it had been a favourite opinion amongst geographers, since his time, that New Zealand was a part of a Southern continent, running north and South, from the 33° to the 64° of South latitude, and its northern coast, stretching cross the South Pacific to an immense distance, where its eastern boundary had been seen by Juan Fernandez, half a century before. Captain Cook’s voyage in the Endeavour has totally destroyed this supposition. Though Tasman must still have the credit of having first seen New Zealand, to Captain Cook solely belongs that of having really explored it. He spent near six months upon its coasts in 1769 and 1770 [18] , circumnavigated it completely, and ascertained its extent and division into two islands. [19] Repeated visits since that have perfected this important discovery, which, though now known to be no part of a Southern continent, will, probably, in all future charts of the world, be distinguished as the largest islands that exist in that part of the Southern hemisphere.

5. Whether New Holland did or did not join to New Guinea, was a question involved in much doubt and uncertainty, before Captain Cook’s sailing between them, through Endeavour Strait, decided it. We will not hesitate to call this an important acquisition to geography. For though the great sagacity and extensive reading of Mr. Dalrymple had discovered some traces of such a passage having been found before [20] , yet these traces were so obscure, and so little known in the present age, that they had not generally regulated the construction of our charts; the President De Brosses [21] , who wrote in 1756, and was well versed in geographical researches, had not been able to satisfy himself about them; and Mons. de Bougainville, in 1768, who had ventured to fall in with the south coast of New Guinea, near ninety leagues to the westward of its south-east point, chose rather to work those ninety leagues directly to windward, at a time when his people were in such distress for provisions as to eat the seal-skins from off the yards and rigging, than to run the risk of finding a passage, of the existence of which he entertained the strongest doubts, by persevering in his westerly course. [22] Captain Cook therefore in this part of his voyage (though he modestly disclaims all merit [23] ), has established, beyond future controversy, a fact of essential service to navigation, by opening, if not a new, at least an unfrequented and forgotten communication between the South Pacific and Indian Oceans.

6. One more discovery, for which we are indebted to Captain Carteret, as similar in some degree to that last mentioned, may properly succeed it in this enumeration. Dampier, in sailing round what was supposed to be part of the coast of New Guinea, discovered it to belong to a separate island, to which he gave the name of New Britain. But that the land which he named New Britain, should be sub-divided again into two separate large islands, with many smaller intervening, is a point of geographical information, which, if ever traced by any of the earliest navigators of the South Pacific, had not been handed down to the present age: and its having been ascertained by Captain Carteret, deserves to be mentioned as a discovery, in the strictest sense of the word; a discovery of the utmost importance to navigation. St. George’s Channel, through which his ship found a way, between New Britain and New Ireland, from the Pacific into the Indian Ocean, to use the Captain’s own words [24] , “is a much better and shorter passage, whether from the eastward or westward, than round all the islands and lands of the northward.” [25]