his crew on a
sand bank. He lost on this occasion three charts respecting his voyages
and particularly Golph Carpentary. After 14 days' passage he arrived at
Port Jackson. After tarrying in said place 8 or 9 days, the Governor
furnished him with the small vessel he is now in, and a ship to take the
remainder of the crew left on the bank. This vessel not being a
government ship and bound to China, proceeded on her intended voyage with
the officers and the crew which had been left on the bank.

"Captain Flinders declares that of the two boxes remitted by him one
contains despatches directed to the Secretary of State and the other was
entrusted to him by the commanding officer of the troops in Port Jackson,
and that he is ignorant what they contain.

"Captain Mw. Flinders to ascertain the legality of this expedition and
the veracity of what he expose,* (* "La verite de son expose," i.e., the
truth of his statement.) has opened in our presence a trunk sealed by him
containing the papers having a reference to his expedition, and to give
us a copy by him certified of the passport delivered to him by the First
Consul and His Majesty King of Great Britain; equally the communication
of his journal since the condemnation of his ship Investigator.

"Port North-West, Ile of France, the 26th frimaire 12th year of the
French Republic (answering to the 19th December, 1803).

"(Signed) MATTW. FLINDERS."

Flinders corroborates the statement regarding the taking of papers from
the trunk, stating that they consisted of the third volume of his rough
log-book, which contained "the whole of what they desired to know,"
respecting his voyage to Ile-de-France. He told Decaen's Secretary to
make such extracts as were considered requisite, "pointing out the
material passages." "All the books and papers, the third volume of my
rough log-book excepted, were then returned into the trunk, and sealed as
before." It is important to notice that at no time were papers taken from
the trunk without Flinders' knowledge and concurrence, because the charge
has frequently been made, even by historical writers of authority,* that
his charts were plagiarised by the cartographers of Baudin's expedition.
(* In the Cambridge Modern History, for instance (9 739): "The French
authorities at Mauritius having captured and imprisoned the explorer
Flinders on his passage to England, attempted by the use of his papers to
appropriate for their ships the credit of his d