The Idea That A Leaky Twenty-Nine Ton Schooner, With Her Pumps Out Of Gear, Could Have Put Into Port Louis With Any Aggressive Intent Against The Great French Nation, Which Had A Powerful Squadron Under Admiral Linois In The Indian Ocean, Was Too Absurd For Consideration.

But Decaen was plainly hunting for reasons for detaining Flinders, and it is possible that he found a shred

Of justification in the despatches which the Cumberland was carrying from Governor King to the British Government; though the protracted character of the imprisonment, after every other member of the ship's company had been set free, cannot have been due to that motive.

It is most probable that representations made to Decaen by Peron, before Le Geographe sailed, had an effect upon the mind of the governor which induced him to regard any ship flying the British flag as an enemy to French policy. Peron, from what he had seen of the growth of Port Jackson, and from the prompt audacity and pugnacious assertiveness of an incident which occurred at King Island - to be described in the ninth chapter - had conceived an inflated idea of the enormity of British pretensions in the southern hemisphere. He was convinced that, using the Sydney settlement as a base of operations, the British intended to dominate the whole Pacific Ocean, even to the degree of menacing the Spanish colonies of South America. On 20th Frimaire, Revolutionary Year 12 (December 11, 1803), four days before Le Geographe sailed from the island, Peron set his views on paper in a report to Decaen, stating that his interviews with officers, magistrates, clergymen, and other classes of people in Sydney, had convinced him that his anticipations were well founded.

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