While The French Lay At King Island, Most Of The Work Done
Up To Date - Geographical, Zoological, And Other - Was Collected And Sent
Back To France On Le Naturaliste; Le Geographe And The Casuarina
Remaining To Finish The Exploratory Voyage.
Le Naturaliste sailed for
Europe on December 16, and entered the port of Havre on June 6, 1803.
Had
Baudin lived to return to France, and to supervise the completion of the
charts, it is most probable that he would have erased the island which
was merely supposed, as he had since charted the real one; but Freycinet,
not having been present at the meeting with Flinders, and knowing nothing
of the reason which induced Baudin to set it down, left it there - a
quaint little fragment of corroboration of the truth of Flinders'
narrative of the Encounter Bay incident.
Now, when at the end of December Le Geographe and the Casuarina sailed
from King Island - the naturalists having in the interval profitably
enjoyed themselves in collecting plants, insects, and marine
specimens - they made direct for Kangaroo Island, four hundred miles away,
to resume the work which had been commenced in the gulfs in the previous
April and May. The whole of the movements of the ships up to this time
are to be read in the printed logs appended to volume 3 of the Voyage de
Decouvertes. Baudin made no call at Port Phillip, nor did one of his
three vessels visit the harbour either before or after reaching King
Island.
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