lace of the Painted Hands', the objective of the third voyage of
Van Bu with Dirk Hartog to New Holland, is referred to by the late Mr
Lawrence Hargrave, who made a very interesting study of picture-writings
discovered in Australia, in a collection of pamphlets entitled "Lope de
Vega", now in the possession of the Mitchell Library at Sydney. "There
are picture-writings," he says, "which have remained for hundreds of
years without any archaeologist discovering their meaning. They are
not as ancient as those on the monuments of the Egyptians, but they are
equally interesting. If they are read in the light of a message to
posterity, they may yet reveal something of surprising interest. By whom
were they chiselled? What is their meaning? The more recent discoveries
show an oval encircling a cross--the symbol of Spanish conquest. On an
ironstone rock-face on the Shoalhaven River are many 'hands.' These have
been there to the memory of the oldest inhabitant. No aboriginal will go
near them. Gold is still washed in this river, and possibly these
hands, or fingers, refer to the days worked here washing gold, or to the
number of 'quills' of gold obtained. You will understand these 'hands'
are not carved, but painted with some pigment that has withstood the
weather for some hundreds of years."

The Malays locate the Male and Female Islands visited by Van Bu, an
account of which appears in many ancient manuscripts from the twelfth
to the sixteenth century, as being the islands of Engarno, to the south
of Sumatra. Marco Polo speaks of them in his voyage round the world,
undertaken in 1271, and both Spanish and Dutch explorers refer to them
in the accounts of their travels of more recent date.

In "The Discovery of Australia" (a critical documentary and historic
investigation concerning the priority of discovery in Australasia by
Europeans before the arrival of Lieutenant James Cook in the Endeavour
in the year 1770), by George Collingridge, may be found accounts of
Spanish and Portuguese attempts at settlement upon the Great Southern
Continent--'Terra Australis'.

Staten Land was the name first given to New Zealand in honour of the
States of Holland, and the monstrous birds seen there were probably the
now extinct moa. The Cannibal Islands are doubtless Fiji. The data and
references to chronicles in this work are genuine, and the result of a
careful study of rare and (in some cases) unique books and manuscripts
in the Mitchell W