uth-west coast of New Caledonia; and
he might have encountered in the night, as we did, some one of the
several reefs which lie scattered in this sea.* (Atlas, Plate I.) Less
fortunate than we were, he probably had no friendly sand bank near him,
upon which his people might be collected together and the means of
existence saved out of the ships; or perhaps his two vessels both took
the unlucky direction of the Cato after striking, and the seas which
broke into them carried away all his boats and provisions; nor would La
Perouse, his vessels, or crews be able, in such a case, to resist the
impetuosity of the waves more than twenty-four hours. If such were the
end of the regretted French navigator, as there is now but too much
reason to fear, it is the counterpart of what would have befallen all on
board the Porpoise and Cato, had the former ship, like the Cato, fallen
over towards the sea instead of heeling to the reef.

[* La Perouse says, in his letter to M. de Fleurieu, dated Feb. 7, 1789
from Botany Bay, "You will doubtless be glad to learn, that I have not
allowed this misfortune (the massacre of captain De l'Angle and eleven
others at the Navigator's Isles) to derange the plan of the remaining
part of my voyage." This plan, as expressed in a preceding letter of
Sept. 7, 1787, at Avatscha, was to "employ six months in visiting the
Friendly Islands to procure refreshments, _the south-west coast of New
Caledonia_, the island of Santa Cruz of Mendana, the southern coast of
the land of the Arsacides, with that of Louisiade as far as New Guinea."
_Voyage of La Perouse_, Translation, London, 1799, VOL. II. p. 494-5,
502-3. As La Pe/rouse did not reach the Friendly Isles, it is probable
that he began with New Caledonia; and that upon the south-west coast, or
in the way to it, disaster befel him.]

An opinion that La Perouse had been lost in this neighbourhood, induced
me when examining the main coast to seek carefully at every place,
amongst the refuse thrown upon the shores, for indications of shipwreck
to windward; and could the search have been then prosecuted to the 15th,
or 12th degree of latitude, I am persuaded it would not have been in
vain. Besides the extensive reefs which skirt the western side of New
Caledonia, and the Barrier Reefs on the opposite coast of New South
Wales, we are now acquainted with the six or eight following distinct
banks of coral in the sea between them, exclusive of Wreck Reef and the
Cat