He Read The Phrase "Augmentation Of The Indies," As
Referring To This And Some Other Additions To The Map Of The World, Now
For The First Time Shown.
In those days, of course, "the Indies" meant
pretty well everything out of Europe, including America.
It is curious
that Flinders called the aboriginals whom he saw in Port Phillip
"Indians." Probably all coloured peoples were "Indians" to seamen even so
late as his day. There is a fine copy of the map referred to in volume 1
of the 1903 edition of Hakluyt, edited by Professor Walter Raleigh.) This
map marks an improvement, in the sense that an approach to the truth,
probably founded on actual observation, is an improvement on a large,
comprehensive piece of guess work. Emmerie Mollineux expunged the
imaginary region, and substituted a small tongue of land, shaped like a
thimble. It was doubtless copied from some Dutch chart; and though we
must not look for precision of outline at so early a date, it is
sufficient to show that some navigator had seen, hereabouts, a real piece
of Australia, and had made a note of what it looked like. It is not much,
but, rightly regarded, it is like the first gleam of light on the dark
sky where the dawn is to paint its radiance.
English Dampier (1686 to 1688, and 1699 to 1701) and Dutch Tasman (1642
to 1644) made the most substantial contributions to the world's knowledge
of the true form of Australia to be credited to any individual navigators
before the coming of Cook, the greatest of all.
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