His Servant Had Made Use Of The Bundle Of Plants As A
Pillow And Having Placed It Too Near The Fire It Was Soon In A Blaze, And
He Was Awaked Only In Time To Save His Face From Being Scorched...
"We were now growing short of provisions and no vessel arriving from
Sydney we set about making preparations for our return thither.
There was
now a small establishment made for the colliers.* (* At Collier's Point.)
I had built them a convenient hut to shelter them. I left them a boat and
seine with what provisions I was able to spare. We took our departure for
Sydney on the 22nd of July 1801, and arrived there on the 25th."
Six weeks after his return to port, Grant sent in his resignation on the
ground that he had so "little knowledge of nautical surveying." The
resignation was accepted by King, who wrote in reply: "I should have been
glad if your ability as a surveyor or being able to determine the
longitude of the different places you might visit was in anyway equal to
your ability as an officer or a seaman."
A very slight perusal of Grant's narrative of his voyage enables us to
grasp the state of his feelings when he sent in his resignation. It is
evident that he thought he had not been treated fairly, and was glad to
quit New South Wales. He writes of his departure: "The mortifications and
disappointments I met with...induced me to seize the first opportunity of
leaving the country." And it seems possible that when he told King that
he had no knowledge of "nautical surveying," he said so because he knew
King thought he had not, and it looks as if the admission was made as a
pretext to obtain his passage to England, rather than for the purpose of
belittling his own capabilities.
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