South Sea or Pacific Ocean Volume 2 Appendix page 475.)

M. DE BOUGAINVILLE.

M. de Bougainville, in June 1768, with two vessels, La Boudeuse and
L'Etoile, was proceeding to the eastward towards the coast of Australia,
when the unexpected discovery of some detached reefs (Bougainville's
reefs of the charts) induced him to alter course and stand to the
northward. No land was seen for three days. "On the 10th, at daybreak,"
says he, "the land was discovered, bearing from east to North-West. Long
before dawn a delicious odour informed us of the vicinity of this land,
which formed a great gulf open to the south-east. I have seldom seen a
country which presented so beautiful a prospect; a low land, divided into
plains and groves, extended along the seashore, and afterwards rose like
an amphitheatre up to the mountains, whose summits were lost in the
clouds. There were three ranges of mountains, and the highest chain was
distant upwards of twenty-five leagues from the shore. The melancholy
condition to which we were reduced* neither allowed us to spend some time
in visiting this beautiful country, which by all appearances was rich and
fertile, nor to stand to the westward in search of a passage to the south
of New Guinea, which might open to us a new and short route to the
Moluccas by way of the Gulf of Carpentaria. Nothing, indeed, was more
probable than the existence of such a passage."** Bougainville, it may be
mentioned, was not aware of the previous discovery of Torres, which
indeed was not published to the world until after our illustrious
navigator Cook, in August, 1770, had confirmed the existence of such a
strait by passing from east to west between the shores of Australia and
New Guinea.

(*Footnote. They were beginning to run short of provisions, and the salt
meat was so bad that the men preferred such RATS as they could catch. It
even became necessary to prevent the crew from eating the LEATHER about
the rigging and elsewhere in the ship.)

(**Footnote. Voyage autour du Monde par la Fregate du Roi La Boudeuse et
la Flute l'Etoile en 1766 a 1769 page 258. See also the chart of the
Louisiade given there, which, however, does not correspond very closely
with the text.)

The Boudeuse and Etoile were engaged in working to windward along this
new land (as it was thought to be) until the 26th, when, having doubled
its eastern point, to which the significant name of Cape Deliverance was
given, they were enabled to be