What has become of the letter he wrote to Phillip recommending
(according to King) the Pacific Islands as worthy of the attention of
the new colony, "for the great quantity of stock with which they
abound"? Apparently it is lost. The grave and the deep have swallowed
up the rest of this "strange eventful history," and we interrogate in
vain. We should know even less than we do were it not that Laperouse
obtained from Phillip permission to send home, by the next British ship
leaving Port Jackson, his journal, some charts, and the drawings of his
artists. This material, added to private letters and a few
miscellaneous papers, was placed in charge of Lieutenant Shortland to
be delivered to the French Ambassador in London, and formed part of the
substance of the two volumes and atlas published in Paris.
* * * * *
It may be well to cite, as a note to this chapter, the books in
which contemporary accounts of the visit of Laperouse and his ships to
Botany Bay are to be found. Some readers may thereby be tempted to look
into the original authorities. Laperouse's own narrative is contained
in the third and fourth volumes of his "Voyage autour du Monde," edited
by Milet-Mureau (Paris, 1797). There are English translations. A few
letters at the end of the work give a little additional information.
Governor Phillip's "Voyage to Botany Bay" (London, 1789) contains a
good but brief account. Phillip's despatch to the Secretary of State,
Lord Sydney, printed in the "Historical Records of New South Wales,"
Vol. I., part 2, p. 121, devotes a paragraph to the subject. King's
Journal in Vol. II. of the "Records," p. 543-7, gives his story.
Surgeon Bowes' Journal, on page 391 of the same volume, contains a
rather picturesque allusion. Hunter's "Voyage to Botany Bay" (London,
1793) substantially repeats King's version. Captain Watkin Tench, of
the Marines, has a good account in his "Narrative of an Expedition to
Botany Bay" (London, 1789), and Paterson's "History of New South Wales"
(Newcastle-on-Tyne, 1811) makes an allusion to the French expedition.
Chapter VIII.
THE MYSTERY, AND THE SECRET OF THE SEA.
The BOUSSOLE and the ASTROLABE sailed from Botany Bay on March 10,
1788. After recording that fact we might well inscribe the pathetic
last words of Hamlet, "the rest is silence."
We know what Laperouse intended to do. He wrote two letters to friends
in France, explaining the programme to be followed after sailing from
Botany Bay. They do not agree in every particular, but we may take the
last letter written to express his final determination. According to
this, his plan was to sail north, passing between Papua ( New Guinea)
and Australia by another channel than Endeavour Strait, if he could
find one. During September and October he intended to visit the Gulf of
Carpentaria, and thence sail down the west and along the south of
Australia, to Tasmania, "but in such a manner that it may be possible
for me to stretch northward in time to arrive at Ile-de-France in the
beginning of December, 1788." That was the programme which he was not
destined to complete - hardly, indeed, to enter upon.
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