of the world, to the year in which the English ship Trial was dashed to
pieces on a rock to westward of the west-coast of Australia; the
discovery of this west-coast by the Dutch in and after 1616, and of the
south-western extremity of the continent in 1622, constituting the main
facts of the period.

{Page iv}

We next come to the palmiest period of Dutch activity in the discovery of
Australia (1622-1688), terminating with the first exploratory voyage of
importance undertaken by the English, when in 1688 William Dampier
touched at the north-west coast of Australia. This period embraces the
very famous, at all events remarkable, voyages of Jan Carstensz (1623),
of Pool and Pieterszoon (1636), of Tasman (1642-1644), of Van der Wall
(1678), etc.

The last period with which we wish to deal, lies between Dampier's
arrival and Cook's first visit to these regions (1688-1769), and is of
secondary importance so far as Dutch discoveries are concerned. We may
just mention Willem de Vlamingh's voyage of 1696-1697, and Maerten van
Delft's of 1705; Gonzal's expedition (1756) is not quite without
significance, but the results obtained in these voyages will not bear
comparison with those achieved by the expeditions of the preceding
period. Besides this, the English navigator Dampier and afterwards
Captain Cook now began to inscribe their names on the rolls of history,
and those names quite legitimately outshine those of the Dutch navigators
of _the eighteenth century_. The palmy days of Dutch discovery fell in
_the seventeenth century_.

In some such fashion the history of the Dutch wanderings and explorations
on the coasts of Australia might be divided into chronological periods.
The desire of being clear has, however, led me to adopt another mode of
treatment in this Introduction: I shall one after another discuss the
different coast-regions discovered and touched at by the Netherlanders.

III.

THE NETHERLANDERS IN THE GULF OF CARPENTARIA[*]

[* As regards the period extending from 1595-1644, see also my Life of
Tasman, Ch. XII, pp. 88ff.]

We may safely say that the information concerning the Far East at the
disposal of those Dutchmen who set sail for India in 1595, was
exclusively based on what their countryman JAN HUYGEN VAN LINSCHOTEN, had
told them in his famous _Itinerario_. And as regards the present
Australia this information amounted to little or nothing.

Unacquainted as he was with the fact that the south-coa