He Pointed Out That Already The English Were Extending Their
Operations To The Sandwich, Friendly, Society, Navigator, And Other
Islands
Of the South Pacific; that at Norfolk Island they had a colony of
between fifteen hundred and sixteen hundred people,
And found its timber
to be of great value for shipbuilding; and that gradually the British
Government, by extending their military posts and trading stations across
the ocean, would sooner or later establish themselves within striking
distance of Chili and Peru.* (* Peron's report to General Decaen is given
in M. Henri Prentout's valuable treatise, L'Ile de France sous Decaen,
1803 to 1810; essai sur la politique coloniale du premier empire, Paris
1901 page 380. M. Prentout's book is extremely fair, and, based as it is
mainly upon the voluminous papers of General Decaen, preserved in his
native town of Caen, is authoritative.) Peron pointed to the political
insecurity of the Spanish-American colonies, and predicted that the
outbreak of revolution in them, possibly with the connivance of the
English, would further the deep designs of that absorbent and dominating
nation.* (* A French author of later date, Prevost-Paradol (La France
Nouvelle, published in 1868), predicted that some day "a new Monroe
doctrine would forbid old Europe, in the name of the United States of
Australia, to put foot upon an isle of the Pacific.")
Decaen was pondering over Peron's inflammatory memorandum when the lame
little Cumberland staggered into Port Louis. Here, a victim ready to
hand, was one of the instruments of the extension of British dominion,
the foremost explorer in the service of the British Crown.
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