reports
were buried in the archives. Quiros died in poverty and bitterness,
and the only traces of his travels are the names Espiritu Santo,
Bay San Iago and San Felipe, and Jordan, in use to this day.

No more explorers came to the islands till 1767, when a Frenchman,
Carteret, touched at Santa Cruz, and 1768, when Bougainville landed
in the northern New Hebrides, leaving his name to the treacherous
channel between Malekula and Santo.

But all these travellers were thrown into the shade by the immortal
discoverer, James Cook, who, in the New Hebrides, as everywhere else,
combined into solid scientific material all that his predecessors had
left in a state of patchwork. Cook's first voyage made possible the
observation of the transit of Venus from one of the islands of the
Pacific. His second cruise, in search of the Australian continent,
led him, coming from Tongoa, to the New Hebrides, of which he first
sighted Maevo.

Assisted by two brilliant scientists, Reinhold and George Forster,
Cook investigated the archipelago with admirable exactitude, determined
the position of the larger islands, made scientific collections of
all sorts, and gave us the first reliable descriptions of the country
and its people, so that the material he gathered is of the greatest
value even at the present day. The group had formerly been known as
the "Great Cyclades"; Cook gave it its present name of "New Hebrides."

Incited by Cook's surprising results the French Government sent La
Perouse to the islands, but he was shipwrecked in 1788 on Vanikoro, the
southern-most of the Santa Cruz group; remains of this wreck were found
on Vanikoro a few years ago. In 1789 Bligh sighted the Banks Islands,
and in 1793 d'Entrecastaux, sent by Louis XVI. to the rescue of La
Perouse, saw the islands of Santa Cruz. Since that time traffic with
the islands became more frequent; among many travellers we may mention
the French captain, Dumont d'Urville, and the Englishmen, Belcher and
Erskine, who, as well as Markham, have all left interesting accounts.

But with Markham we enter that sad period which few islands of the
Pacific escaped, in which the scum of the white race carried on
their bloodstained trade in whaling products and sandalwood. They
terrorized the natives shamelessly, and when these, naturally enough,
often resorted to cruel modes of defence, they retaliated with deeds
still more frightful, and the bad reputation they themselves made
for th