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A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 by Robert Kerr

R >> Robert Kerr >> A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13




After steering S.W. by W. six miles, we had shoal water on our starboard
bow, which I sent the yawl to sound, and at the same time hauled off
upon a wind till four o'clock, and though during that time we had run
six miles, we had not deepened our water an inch. I then edged away S.W.
four miles more; but finding it still shoal water, I brought-to and
called the boats aboard. At this time, being between three and four
leagues from the shore, and the yawl having found only three fathom
water in the place to which I had sent her to sound, I hauled off close
upon a wind, and weathered the shoal about half a mile.

Between one and two o'clock we passed a bay or inlet, before which lies
a small island that seems to shelter it from the southerly winds; but I
very much doubt whether there is sufficient depth of water behind it for
shipping. I could not attempt to determine the question, because the
S.E. trade-wind blows right into the bay, and we had not as yet had any
breeze from the land.

We stretched off to sea till twelve o'clock, when we were about eleven
leagues from the land, and had deepened our water to twenty-nine fathom.
We now tacked and stood in till five in the morning, when, being in six
fathom and a half, we tacked and laid the head of the vessel off till
daylight, when we saw the land, bearing N.W. by W., at about the
distance of four leagues. We now made sail, and steered first W.S.W.,
then W. by S.; but coming into five fathom and a half, we hauled off
S.W. till we deepened our water to eight fathom, and then kept away W.
by S. and W., having nine fathom, and the land just in sight from the
deck; we judged it to be about four leagues distant, and it was still
very low and woody. Great quantities of the brown scum continued to
appear upon the water, and the sailors having given up the notion of its
being spawn, found a new name for it, and called it sea saw-dust. At
noon, our latitude, by observation, was 8 deg. 30' S., our longitude 222 deg.
34' W.; and Saint Bartholomew's Isle bore N. 69 E., distant seventy-four
miles.

As all this coast appears to have been very minutely examined by the
Dutch, and as our track will appear by the chart, it is sufficient to
say, that we continued our course to the northward with very shallow
water, upon a bank of mud, at such a distance from the shore as that it
could scarcely be seen from the ship till the third of September. During
this time we made many attempts to get near enough to go on shore, but
without success; and having now lost six days of fair wind, at a time
when we knew the south-east monsoon to be nearly at an end, we began to
be impatient of farther delay, and determined to run the ship in as near
to the shore as possible, and then land with the pinnace, while she kept
plying off and on to examine the produce of the country, and the
disposition of the inhabitants. For the two last days we had, early in
the morning, a light breeze from the shore, which was strongly
impregnated with the fragrance of the trees, shrubs, and herbage that
covered it, the smell being something like that of gum Benjamin. On the
3d of September, at day-break, we saw the land extending from N. by E.
to S.E., at about four leagues distance, and we then kept standing in
for it with a fresh gale at E.S.E. and E. by S. till nine o'clock, when
being within about three or four miles of it, and in three fathom water,
we brought-to. The pinnace being hoisted out, I set off from the ship
with the boat's crew, accompanied by Mr Banks, who also took his
servants, and Dr Solander, being in all twelve persons, well armed; we
rowed directly towards the shore, but the water was so shallow that we
could not reach it by about two hundred yards; we waded, however, the
rest of the way, having left two of the seamen to take care of the boat.
Hitherto we had seen no signs of inhabitants at this place; but as soon
as we got ashore we discovered the prints of human feet, which could not
long have been impressed upon the sand, as they were below high-water
mark: We therefore concluded that the people were at no great distance,
and, as a thick wood came down within a hundred yards of the water, we
thought it necessary to proceed with caution, lest we should fall into
an ambuscade, and our retreat to the boat be cut off. We walked along
the skirts of the wood, and at the distance of about two hundred yards
from the place where we landed, we came to a grove of cocoa-nut trees,
which stood upon the banks of a little brook of brackish water. The
trees were of a small growth, but well hung with fruit; and near them
was a shed or hut, which had been covered with their leaves, though most
of them were now fallen off: About the hut lay a great number of the
shells of the fruit, some of which appeared to be just fresh from the
tree. We looked at the fruit very wishfully, but not thinking it safe to
climb, we were obliged to leave it without tasting a single nut. At a
little distance from this place we found plantains, and a bread-fruit
tree, but it had nothing upon it; and having now advanced about a
quarter of a mile from the boat, three Indians rushed out of the wood
with a hideous shout, at about the distance of a hundred yards; and as
they ran towards us, the foremost threw something out of his hand, which
flew on one side of him, and burnt exactly like gunpowder, but made no
report: The other two instantly threw their lances at us; and as no time
was now to be lost, we discharged our pieces, which were loaded with
small shot. It is probable that they did not feel the shot, for though
they halted a moment, they did not retreat; and a third dart was thrown
at us. As we thought their farther approach might be prevented with less
risk of life than it would cost to defend ourselves against their attack
if they should come nearer, we loaded our pieces with ball, and fired a
second time: By this discharge it is probable that some of them were
wounded; yet we had the satisfaction to see that they all ran away with
great agility. As I was not disposed forcibly to invade this country,
either to gratify our appetites or our curiosity, and perceived that
nothing was to be done upon friendly terms, we improved this interval,
in which the destruction of the natives was no longer necessary to our
own defence, and with all expedition returned towards our boat. As we
were advancing along the shore, we perceived that the two men on board
made signals that more Indians were coming down; and before we got into
the water we saw several of them coming round a point at the distance of
about five hundred yards: It is probable that they had met with the
three who first attacked as; for as soon as they saw us they halted, and
seemed to wait till their main body should come up. We entered the water
and waded towards the boat, and they remained at their station, without
giving us any interruption. As soon as we were aboard we rowed abreast
of them, and their number then appeared to be between sixty and a
hundred. We now took a view of them at our leisure; they made much the
same appearance as the New Hollanders, being nearly of the same stature,
and having their hair short cropped: Like them also, they were all stark
naked, but we thought the colour of their skin was not quite so dark;
this however might perhaps be merely the effect of their not being
quite so dirty. All this while they were shouting defiance, and letting
off their fires by four or five at a time. What these fires were, or for
what purpose intended, we could not imagine: Those who discharged them
had in their hands a short piece of stick, possibly a hollow cane, which
they swung sideways from them, and we immediately saw fire and smoke,
exactly resembling those of a musket, and of no longer duration. This
wonderful phenomenon was observed from the ship, and the deception was
so great that the people on board thought they had fire-arms; and in the
boat, if we had not been so near as that we must have heard the report,
we should have thought they had been firing volleys.[99] After we had
looked at them attentively some time, without taking any notice of their
flashing and vociferation, we fired some muskets over their heads: Upon
hearing the balls rattle among the trees, they walked leisurely away,
and we returned to the ship. Upon examining the weapons they had thrown
at us, we found them to be light darts, about four feet long, very ill
made, of a reed or bamboo cane, and pointed with hard wood, in which
there were many barbs. They were discharged with great force; for though
we were at sixty yards distance, they went beyond us, but in what manner
we could not exactly see; possibly they might be shot with a bow, but we
saw no bows among them when we surveyed them from the boat, and we were
in general of opinion that they were thrown, with a stick, in the manner
practised by the New Hollanders.

[Footnote 99: So far as the writer recollects, no satisfactory account
of this singular fact has been given. He has long borne it in
remembrance, and sought for further information respecting it, but
hitherto has failed. He can conjecture, it is true, two or three modes
of explanation; but he does not chuse to be wise abase what is
written.--E.]

This place lies in the latitude of 6 deg. 15' S., and about sixty-five
leagues to the N.E. of Port Saint Augustine, or Walche Cape, and is near
what is called in the charts C. de la Colta de St Bonaventura. The land
here, like that in every other part of the coast, is very low, but
covered with a luxuriance of wood and herbage that can scarcely be
conceived. We saw the cocoa-nut, the bread-fruit, and the plantain tree,
all flourishing in a state of the highest perfection, though the
cocoa-nuts were green, and the bread-fruit not in season; besides most
of the trees, shrubs, and plants that are common to the South-Sea
islands, New Zealand, and New Holland.

Soon after our return to the ship, we hoisted in the boat, and made sail
to the westward, being resolved to spend no more time upon this coast,
to the great satisfaction of a very considerable majority of the ship's
company. But I am sorry to say that I was strongly urged by some of the
officers to send a party of men ashore and cut down the cocoa-nut trees
for the sake of the fruit. This I peremptorily refused, as equally
unjust and cruel. The natives had attacked us merely for landing upon
their coast, when we attempted to take nothing away, and it was
therefore morally certain that they would have made a vigorous effort to
defend their property if it had been invaded, in which case many of them
must have fallen a sacrifice to our attempt, and perhaps also some of
our own people. I should have regretted the necessity of such a measure,
if I had been in want of the necessaries of life, and certainly it would
have been highly criminal when nothing was to be obtained but two or
three hundred of green cocoa-nuts, which would at most have procured us
a mere transient gratification.[100] I might indeed have proceeded
farther along the coast to the northward and westward, in search of a
place where the ship might have lain so near the shore as to cover the
people with her guns when they landed; but this would have obviated only
part of the mischief, and though it might have secured us, would
probably in the very act have been fatal to the natives. Besides, we had
reason to think that before such a place would have been found, we
should have been carried so far to the westward as to have been obliged
to go to Batavia, on the north side of Java, which I did not think so
safe a passage as to the south of Java, through the Streights of Sunday:
The ship also was so leaky, that I doubted whether it would not be
necessary to heave her down at Batavia, which was another reason for
making the best of our way to that place, especially as no discovery
could be expected in seas which had already been navigated, and where
every coast had been laid down by the Dutch geographers. The Spaniards,
indeed, as well as the Dutch, seem to have circumnavigated all the
islands in New Guinea, as almost every place that is distinguished in
the chart has a name in both languages. The charts with which I compared
such part of the coast as I visited, are bound up with a French work,
entitled, "Histoire des Navigationes aux Terres Australes," which was
published in 1756, and I found them tolerably exact; yet I know not by
whom, or when they were taken: And though New Holland and New Guinea are
in them represented as two distinct countries, the very history in which
they are bound up, leaves it in doubt.[101] I pretend, however, to no
more merit in this part of the voyage than to have established the fact
beyond all controversy.

[Footnote 100: Delicacy of feeling, perhaps, would have preferred the
omission of what has now been recorded as to the advice of some of the
officers, to the stating it in such a manner as leaves the responsible
persons under the shade of the guiltless, or implicates the latter in
the odium of the former. The advice, at all events, might have been
stated impersonally, as a mere suggestion that would naturally present
itself to any one who considered the benefit of the crew only, without
respect to the rights and properties of the natives,--a suggestion,
however, which it required but a moment's reflection on the laws of
humanity to dissipate with reproach. Some readers, it is probable, will
be sensible, as well as the writer, of an uncomfortable emotion at the
perusal of this part of the text, exclusive entirely of disapprobation
of the matter of which it treats.--E.]

[Footnote 101: The work here mentioned was the valuable labour of
President De Brosses, and appeared at Paris, in two vols. quarto. It was
translated into English, and published at London in 1767. We shall
hereafter have occasion to cull some information from it, and to revert
to the fact of the separation of New Holland and New Guinea now alluded
to. Callender published a work at Edinburgh, in 1766, in three vols.
octavo, entitled, "Terra Australis Cognita; or Voyages to the Terra
Australis, or Southern Hemisphere, &c." It bore to be an original, but
is in fact a translation of what has now been mentioned.--E.]

As the two countries lie very near each other, and the intermediate
space is full of islands, it is reasonable to suppose that they were
both peopled from one common stock; yet no intercourse appears to have
been kept up between them; for if there had, the cocoa-nuts,
bread-fruit, plantains, and other fruits of New Guinea, which are
equally necessary for the support of life, would certainly have been
transplanted to New Holland, where no traces of them are to be found.
The author of the "Histoire des Navigationes aux Terres Australes," in
his account of La Maire's voyage, has given a vocabulary of the language
that is spoken in an island near New Britain, and we find, by comparing
that vocabulary with the words which we learnt in New Holland, that the
languages are not the same. If therefore it should appear that the
languages of New Britain and New Guinea are the same, there will be
reason to suppose that New Britain and New Guinea were peopled from a
common stock, but that the inhabitants of New Holland had a different
origin, notwithstanding the proximity of the countries.[102]

[Footnote 102: An interesting enough subject for enquiry is here
started. We shall, in another part of our work, have to give it some
attention.--E.]


SECTION XXXV.

_The Passage from New Guinea to the Island of Semau, and the
Transactions there_.[103]


[Footnote 103: It is quite unnecessary, and would answer no good
purpose, to occupy the reader's attention with any geographical notes
respecting the islands mentioned in this section. Subsequent voyages,
and other publications, have greatly enriched our acquaintance with this
subject; but it would make sad patch-work to detail it here. The reader
will do better to amuse himself with the narrative for the present, and
to reserve study for a future occasion.--E.]

We made sail, from noon on Monday the 3d, to noon on Tuesday the 4th,
standing to the westward, and all the time kept in soundings, having
from fourteen to thirty fathom; not regular, but sometimes more,
sometimes less. At noon on the 4th, we were in fourteen fathom, and
latitude 6 deg. 44' S., longitude 223 deg. 51' W.; our course and distance since
the 3d, at noon, were S. 76 W., one hundred and twenty miles to the
westward. At noon on the 5th of September, we were in latitude 7 deg. 25'
S., longitude 225 deg. 41' W., having been in soundings the whole time from
ten to twenty fathom.

At half an hour after one in the morning of the next day, we passed a
small island which bore from us N.N.W., distant between three and four
miles; and at day-light we discovered another low island, extending from
N.N.W. to N.N.E., distant about two or three leagues. Upon this island,
which did not appear to be very small, I believe I should have landed to
examine its produce, if the wind had not blown too fresh to admit of it.
When we passed this island we had only ten fathom water, with a rocky
bottom, and therefore I was afraid of running down to leeward, lest I
should meet with shoal water and foul ground. These islands have no
place in the charts except they are the Arrou islands; and if these,
they are laid down much too far from New Guinea. I found the south part
of them to lie in latitude 7 deg. 6' S., longitude 225 deg. W.

We continued to steer W.S.W., at the rate of four miles and a half an
hour, till ten o'clock at night, when we had forty-two fathom, at eleven
we had thirty-seven, at twelve forty-five, at one in the morning,
forty-nine, and at three, 120, after which we had no ground. At
day-light we made all the sail we could, and at ten o'clock saw land
extending from N.N.W. to W. by N., distant between five and six leagues:
At noon it bore from N. to W., and at about the same distance: It
appeared to be level, and of a moderate height; by our distance from New
Guinea, it ought to have been part of the Arrou Islands, but it lies a
degree farther to the south than any of these islands are laid down in
the charts; and, by the latitude, should be Timor Laoet: We sounded, but
had no ground with fifty fathom.

As I was not able to satisfy myself from any chart, what land it was
that I saw to leeward, and fearing that it might trend away more
southerly, the weather also being so hazy that we could not see far, I
steered S.W., and by four had lost sight of the island. I was now sure
that no part of it lay to the southward of 8 deg. 15' S., and continued
standing to the S.W. with an easy sail, and a fresh breeze at S.E. by E.
and E.S.E.: We sounded every hour, but had no bottom with 120 fathom.

At day-break in the morning, we steered W.S.W., and afterwards W. by S.,
which by noon brought us into the latitude of 9 deg. 30' S., longitude 229 deg.
34' W., and by our run from New Guinea, we ought to have been within
sight of Weasel Isles, which in the charts are laid down at the distance
of twenty or twenty-five leagues from the coast of New Holland; we
however saw nothing, and therefore they must have been placed
erroneously; nor can this be thought strange, when it is considered that
not only these islands, but the coast which bounds this sea, have been
discovered and explored by different people, and at different times, and
the charts upon which they are delineated, put together by others,
perhaps at the distance of more than a century after the discoveries had
been made; not to mention that the discoverers themselves had not all
the requisites for keeping an accurate journal, of which those of the
present age are possessed.

We continued our course, steering W. till the evening of the 8th, when
the variation of the compass, by several azimuths, was 12' W., and by
the amplitude 5' W. At noon, on the 9th, our latitude, by observation,
was 9 deg. 46' S., longitude 232 deg. 7' W. For the last two days we had steered
due W., yet, by observation, we made sixteen miles southing, six miles
from noon on the 6th to noon on the 7th, and ten miles from noon on the
7th to noon on the 8th, by which it appeared that there was a current
setting to the southward. At sun-set, we found the variation to be 2 W.,
and at the same time, saw an appearance of very high land bearing N.W.

In the morning of the 10th, we saw clearly that what had appeared to be
land the night before, was Timor. At noon, our latitude, by observation,
was 10 deg. 1' S., which was fifteen miles to the southward of that given by
the log; our longitude, by observation, was 233 deg. 27' W. We steered N.W.
in order to obtain a more distinct view of the land in sight, till four
o'clock in the morning of the 11th, when the wind came to the N.W. and
W., with which we stood to the southward till nine, when we tacked and
stood N.W., having the wind now at W.S.W. At sun-rise the land had
appeared to extend from W.N.W. to N.E., and at noon, we could see it
extend to the westward as far as W. by S. 1/2 S. but no farther to the
eastward than N. by E. We were now well assured, that as the first land
we had seen was Timor, the last island we had passed was Timor Laoet, or
Laut.[104] Laoet, is a word in the language of Malaca, signifying Sea,
and this island was named by the inhabitants of that country. The south
part of it lies in latitude 8 deg. 15' S., longitude 228 deg. 10' W., but in the
charts the south point is laid down in various latitudes, from 8 deg. 30' to
9 deg. 30': It is indeed possible that the land we saw might be some other
island, but the presumption to the contrary is very strong, for if Timor
Laut had lain where it is placed in the charts, we must have seen it
there. We were now in latitude 9 deg. 37' S.; longitude, by an observation
of the sun and moon, 233 deg. 54' W.; we were the day before in 233 deg. 27';
the difference is 27', exactly the same that was given by the log: This,
however, is a degree of accuracy in observation that is seldom to be
expected. In the afternoon, we stood in shore till eight in the evening;
when we tacked and stood off, being at the distance of about three
leagues from the land, which at sun-set extended from S.W. 1/2 W. to
N.E.: At this time we sounded, and had no ground with 140 fathom. At
midnight, having but little wind, we tacked and stood in, and at noon
the next day, our latitude, by observation, was 9 deg. 36' S. This day, we
saw smoke on shore in several places, and had seen many fires during the
night. The land appeared to be very high, rising in gradual slopes one
above another: The hills were in general covered with thick woods, but
among them we could distinguish naked spots of a considerable extent,
which had the appearance of having been cleared by art. At five o'clock
in the afternoon, we were within a mile and a half of the shore, in
sixteen fathom water, and abreast of a small inlet into the low land,
which lies in latitude 9 deg. 34 S., and probably is the same that Dampier
entered with his boat, for it did not seem to have sufficient depth of
water for a ship. The land here answered well to the description that he
has given of it: close to the beach it was covered with high spiry
trees, which he mentions as having the appearance of pines; behind these
there seemed to be salt-water creeks, and many mangroves, interspersed
however with cocoa-nut trees: The flat land at the beach appeared in
some places to extend inward two or three miles before the rise of the
first hill; in this part, however, we saw no appearance of plantations
or houses, but great fertility, and from the number of fires, we judged
that the place most be well peopled.

[Footnote 104: Little is known of this island. Timor is said to have
been discovered by the companions of Magellan in 1522, when it was found
full of white sandal wood. The Portuguese very early settled in it as a
place of refuge from the Dutch, who however soon followed them, and in
1613, drove them from Cupan, their principal town, at the west end of
the island. The possession of this island might be made more valuable
than it seems as yet to have been. With scarcely any help from human
industry, its products in useful articles are considerable. We shall
have to treat of it hereafter.--E.]

When we had approached within a mile and a half of the shore, we tacked
and stood off, and the extremes of the coast then extended from N.E. by
E. to W. by S. 1/2 S. The south-westerly extremity was a low point,
distant from us about three leagues. While we were standing in for the
shore, we sounded several times, but had no ground till we came within
about two miles and a half, and then we had five-and-twenty fathom, with
a soft-bottom. After we had tacked, we stood off till midnight, with the
wind at S.; we then tacked and stood two hours to the westward, when the
wind veered to S.W. and W.S.W., and we then stood to the southward
again. In the morning, we found the variation to be 1 deg. 10' W. by the
amplitude, and by the azimuth 1 deg. 27'. At noon, our latitude was, by
observation, 9 deg. 45' S., our longitude 234 deg. 12' W.; we were then about
seven leagues distant from the land, which extended from N. 31 E. to
W.S.W. 1/2 W.

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The mother of a lawyer who says her daughter's best-selling "misery memoir" is fiction broke down in court yesterday as she told a jury how she had struggled to raise her family. Carmen Briscoe-Mitchell is suing barrister Constance Briscoe for libel. Briscoe alleged she had suffered abuse and neglect during her south London childhood in Ugly, the first part of her autobiography published in 2006.

Briscoe-Mitchell began crying as she described her relationship with George Briscoe, father of seven of her 11 children, on the second day of the hearing at the high court in London at which she is also suing the book's publishers Hodder and Stoughton over her daughter's claims. Her counsel, William Panton, said Briscoe was "spinning a yarn". Her mother had worked as a dressmaker to keep her children, often without their father, and had provided for them equally to the best of her ability, an assertion supported by Briscoe's siblings, he said. Briscoe painted a picture of being regularly punched, kicked and beaten with a stick by her mother, said Panton, yet had not complained to police, social services or teachers.

Briscoe's lawyer, Andrew Caldecott QC, said the jury must remember when they heard witnesses that they were dealing with events between 1964 and 1975 when Briscoe-Mitchell, 74, was in her prime, not a vulnerable old lady, and Briscoe was a child. "Constance Briscoe says she was the victim of sustained cruelty and serious neglect when she was a child. She chose to say it. She has to prove it."

The trial was not of the accuracy of every word or paragraph in the book but of whether or not it was true that Briscoe was physically and emotionally abused by her mother over a lengthy period, said Caldecott. "We say this is a book that has its share of errors but it was properly put in the biography section of a bookshop, not in the fiction section."

Briscoe-Mitchell was asked about her relationship with George Briscoe. "My husband wasn't there to help me along with his children. I've had a very hard time with my husband. He wouldn't maintain them, he wasn't there. It was rough, it wasn't easy but I managed.

"He was in and out. He'd just come and make a baby and go back to his girlfriend and that was my life. It was too much. He'd come and kick the door off." Briscoe-Mitchell said she had four times taken him to court for maintenance. The only time she received any payment was when he was arrested and police gave her the £15 in his pocket. "He didn't want to know about his children, he got no interest there at all."

The case continues.

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