Here We Took In Water, And
Other Refreshments, With All The Conveniency Imaginable.
We made
the whole circuit of the island, which we found well-stocked with
cocoa-trees, very regularly planted;
We likewise saw abundance of
gardens, extremely well laid out, plentifully stocked with all kinds
of fruit-trees, all planted in straight lines, and the whole kept in
such excellent order, that nothing could have a better effect upon
the eye. After quitting the island of Rotterdam, we had sight of
several other islands; which, however, did not engage us to alter
the resolution we had taken of sailing north, to the height of 17
degrees south latitude, and from thence to shape a west course,
without going near either Traitor's Island, or those of Horne, we
having then a very brisk wind from the south-east, or east-south-
east.
I cannot help remarking upon this part of Captain Tasman's journal,
that it is not easy to conceive, unless he was bound up by leis
instructions, why he did not remain some time either at Rotterdam or
at Amsterdam Island, but especially at the former; since, perhaps,
there is not a place in the world so happily seated, for making new
discoveries with ease and safety. He owns that he traversed the
whole island, that he found it a perfect paradise, and that the
people gave him not the least cause of being diffident in point of
security; so that if his men had thrown up ever so slight a
fortification, a part of them might have remained there in safety,
while the rest had attempted the discovery of the Islands of Solomon
on the one hand, or the continent of De Quiros on the other, from
neither of which they were at any great distance, and, from his
neglecting this opportunity, I take it for granted that he was
circumscribed, both as to his course and to the time he was to
employ in these discoveries, by his instructions, for otherwise so
able a seaman and so curious a man as his journal shows him to have
been, would not certainly have neglected so fair an opportunity.
CHAPTER XI: AND AN ARCHIPELAGO OF TWENTY SMALL ISLANDS.
On February 6th, being in 17 degrees 19 minutes of south latitude,
and in the longitude of 201 degrees 35 minutes, we found ourselves
embarrassed by nineteen or twenty small islands, every one of which
was surrounded with sands, shoals, and rocks. These are marked in
the charts by the name of Prince William's Islands, or Heemskirk's
Shallows. On the 8th we were in the latitude of 15 degrees 29
minutes, and in the longitude of 199 degrees 31 minutes. We had
abundance of rain, a strong wind from the north-east, or the north-
north-east, with dark cold weather. Fearing, therefore, that we
were run farther to the west than we thought ourselves by our
reckoning, and dreading that we should fall to the south of New
Guinea, or be thrown upon some unknown coast in such blowing misty
weather, we resolved to stand away to the north, or to the north-
north-west, till we should arrive in the latitude of 4, 5, or 6
degrees south, and then to bear away west for the coast of New
Guinea, as the least dangerous way that we could take.
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