Bristow Island to the northward and eastward for a distance of 120
miles.

M. RUALT COUTANCE.

In 1804, M. Rualt Coutance, commanding the French privateer L'Adele, made
several discoveries on the south-east coast of New Guinea which were
recorded by Freycinet, from the manuscript journal of Coutance, in the
history of Baudin's voyage.* A portion of this is unquestionably the land
seen by Captain Bligh in 1792--but in addition detached portions of the
shores of the great bight of the south-east coast were seen, as in the
neighbourhood of Freshwater Bay and elsewhere.

(*Footnote. Voyage de decouvertes aux Terres Australes, execute sur les
corvettes Le Geographe, Le Naturaliste, et la goelette La
Casuarina--pendant les annees 1801 a 1804, sous le commandement du
Capitaine de vaisseau N. Baudin. Redige par M. Louis Freycinet.
Navigation et Geographie page 462 and Atlas plate 1.)

Mr. Bristow, the master of an English merchant vessel, visited the
northern part of the Louisiade Archipelago in 1806, but added nothing of
consequence to our knowledge of the group, although various islands were
named anew, as if discoveries of his own. His Satisfaction Island is
clearly Rossel's, and Eruption Island is St. Aignan's of
D'Entrecasteaux.*

(*Footnote. See Krusenstern's Recueil de Memoires Hydrographiques etc.
page 154.)

CAPTAIN DUMONT D'URVILLE.

Since Bougainville's voyage the southern shores of the Louisiade remained
unvisited until the year 1840, when Captain Dumont d'Urville, with the
French corvettes L'Astrolabe and La Zelee, during his last voyage round
the world, determined upon attempting their exploration. On May 23rd, the
expedition (coming from the eastward) rounded Adele Island and Cape
Deliverance, at the distance of about twenty miles. Next morning, the
thickness of the weather prevented them from clearly distinguishing the
features of the land. They steered towards South-east Island, but found
close approach prevented by an immense continuous reef, supposed to be
part of that seen on the previous day to the southward of Rossel Island.
On Conde's Peninsula, some natives and a small village were observed. In
the evening a long line of islands (the Calvados group) appeared to the
north, and the reef, which before had been continuous, with the exception
of some small openings, now existed only as a few isolated patches.
D'Urville stood off to sea for the night, and next morning passed close
to some low woody i