Such Was The Information Collected By Captain Peter Dillon In 1826.
He
took away with him the sword guard, but regretted to learn that the
silver spoon had been beaten into wire by Bushart for making rings and
ornaments for female islanders.
When he reached Calcutta, Dillon wrote an account of his discovery in a
letter to the government of Bengal, and suggested that he should be
sent in command of an expedition to search the Vanikoro cluster in the
hope of finding some old survivor of Laperouse's unhappy company, or at
all events further remains of the ships. He had prevailed upon
Martin Bushart to accompany him to India, and hoped, through this man's
knowledge of the native tongue, to elicit all that was to be known.
The Government of British India became interested in Dillon's
discovery, and resolved to send him in command of a ship to search for
further information. At the end of 1826 he sailed in the RESEARCH, and
in September of the following year came within sight of the high-peaked
island Tucopia. The enquiries made on this voyage fully confirmed and
completed the story, and left no room for doubt that the ships of
Laperouse had been wrecked and his whole company massacred or drowned
on or near Vanikoro. Many natives still living remembered the arrival
of the French. Some of them related that they thought those who came on
the big ships to be not men but spirits; and such a grotesque bit of
description as was given of the peaks of cocked hats exactly expressed
the way in which the appearance of the strangers would be likely to
appeal to the native imagination:
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