orated. It
may be remarked as curious that a naval officer so proud of his service
as Flinders was, should nowhere have employed the name of the greatest
sailor of his age, Nelson. There is a Cape Nelson on the Victorian coast,
but that name was given by Grant.

In Spencer's Gulf we come upon a group of Lincolnshire place-names, for
Flinders, his brother Samuel, the mate, Fowler, and Midshipman John
Franklin, all serving on this voyage, were Lincolnshire men. Thus we find
Port Lincoln, Sleaford Bay, Louth Bay, Cape Donington, Stamford Hill,
Surfleet Point, Louth Isle, Sibsey Isle, Stickney Isle, Spilsby Isle,
Partney Isle, Revesby Isle, Point Boston, and Winceby Isle. Banks' name
was given to a group of islands, and Coffin's Bay must not be allowed to
suggest any gruesome association, for it was named after Sir Isaac
Coffin, resident naval commissioner at Sheerness, who had given
assistance in the equipment of the Investigator. A few names, like
Streaky Bay, Lucky Bay, and Cape Catastrophe, were applied from
circumstances that occurred on the voyage. A poet of the antipodes who
should, like Wordsworth, be moved to write "Poems on the Naming of
Places," would find material in the names given by Flinders.

Interest in this absorbing work rose to something like excitement on
February 20th, when there were indications, from the set of the tide,
that an unusual feature of the coast was being approached. "The tide from
the north-eastward, apparently the ebb, ran more than one mile an hour,
which was the more remarkable from no set of the tide worthy to be
noticed having hitherto been observed upon this coast." The ship had
rounded Cape Catastrophe, and the land led away to the north, whereas
hitherto it had trended east and south. What did this mean? Flinders must
have been strongly reminded of his experience in the Norfolk in Bass
Strait, when the rush of the tide from the south showed that the
north-west corner of Van Diemen's Land had been turned, and that the
demonstration of the Strait's existence was complete. There were many
speculations as to what the signs indicated. "Large rivers, deep inlets,
inland seas and passages into the Gulf of Carpentaria, were terms
frequently used in our conversations of this evening, and the prospect of
making an interesting discovery seemed to have infused new life and
vigour into every man in the ship." The expedition was, in fact, in the
bell-mouth of Spencer's Gulf, and the next few