ALTERATIONS TO THE RESOLUTION.

Two days after receiving his orders, Cook hoisted his pendant and superintended the alterations that were to be made for the accommodation of Mr. Banks and his party of scientists. These comprised Dr. Solander, Zoffani, the portrait painter, Dr. Lynd of Edinburgh, to secure whose services Parliament had made a special grant of 4000 pounds (though "what discoveries they expected him to make I could not understand," says Cook), and nine others, draughtsmen and servants; at least three more than had been thought necessary when the vessel was purchased. These alterations were:

"to raise her upper works about a foot, to lay a spar deck upon her from the quarter-deck to the forecastle (she having at this time a low waist), and to build a round house or coach for my accommodation, so that the great cabin might be appropriated to the use of Mr. Banks alone."

The Comptroller of the Navy, Captain Pallisser, was strongly opposed to these alterations as likely to be detrimental to the ship's sailing qualities, and though his opinions were overborne, they in the end proved to be correct.

When he had seen the alterations fairly on the way, Cook applied for three weeks' leave of absence, on the plea that he had "some business to transact in Yorkshire, as well as to see an aged father," and his application was at once granted. He therefore went to Ayton, where for the first time for seventeen years he was again amongst his own people. From Ayton he went on to Whitby, and was met some miles out from that town by many of the leading men of the place. From the Walkers he received the heartiest of welcomes, and it is related that the old housekeeper, Mary Prowd, had been carefully instructed that a Commander in His Majesty's Navy was a very different person from one of her master's apprentices, and must be received with all the marks of respect due to his rank. She promised obedience, but, alas, when the time came her memory fled, and opening wide her arms, she exclaimed: "O honey James! How glad I is to see thee!" A welcome, probably, more dear to Cook than any other could have been, and a proof of the affectionate regard he could inspire.

In February he was back in London, and Dr. Burney says in his Memoirs:

"I had the honour of receiving the illustrious Captain Cook to dine with me in Queen's Square [Bloomsbury] previously to his second voyage round the world. Observing upon a table, Bougainville's Voyage Autour du Monde, he turned it over, and made some curious remarks on the illiberal conduct of that circumnavigator towards himself when they met and crossed each other; which made me desirous to know, in examining the chart of M. de Bougainville, the several tracks of the two navigators, and exactly where they had crossed or approached each other.

"Captain Cook instantly took a pencil from his pocket book and said he would trace the route; which he did in so clear and scientific a manner that I would not take fifty pounds for my book. The pencil marks, having been fixed by skim milk, will always be visible."

This volume is now in the British Museum, and the pencil marks on the chart are as distinct as on the day they were made.

The alterations to the ship were completed early in February, and on the 6th she was hauled out of dock, and rigging, ballasting, and storing commenced. Cook says:

"Every department seemed to vie with the other in equiping these two ships, every standing rule and order in the Navy was dispensed with, every alteration, every necessary and useful article, was granted as soon as asked for."