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

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Bougainville now made sail to the S.W. for a long coast in sight,
extending as far as the eye could reach, from S.W. to W.N.W., but as
there was little or no wind during the 24th, both day and night, he was
left to the mercy of the currents, which would scarcely allow him to get
three leagues off the Isle of Lepers. He advanced somewhat better on the
25th, though the Etoile still lay becalmed, and at last found himself,
as it were, shut up in a great gulph in the land, which lay to the west.
Not knowing whether he was so or not, it became necessary to stand again
towards that island, and in consequence the 25th was lost in making
short tacks, which were the more required, as the Etoile did not feel
the breeze till the evening.

The bearings taken on the 26th, shewed that the currents had taken them
several miles to the southward of their reckoning. Whitsun-isle still
appeared separated from the S.W. land, but by a narrower passage, and
what had before been considered a continued coast, was now found to be a
cluster of islands. Some agreeable appearances induced several attempts
at landing, but they were unavailing, and only exposed those that made
them to attacks from the natives, who seemed to concur with the natural
difficulties around their islands, in preventing too near an approach.
Bougainville bestowed the name of Archipelago of the Great Cyclades on
these very numerous isles, which lie in 30 deg. S. latitude, and 180 deg.
longitude west of Ferro, and which have been better known since the time
of Cook by the name of New Hebrides. During Bougainville's being on
board the Etoile about this time, transacting some necessary business,
he had the opportunity of verifying a report, which had for a good while
been circulated in both ships, viz. that M. de Commercon's servant,
named Bare, was a woman. Several suspicious circumstances had been
noticed as to her sex, and something amounting to a discovery of it had
been made, it seems, by the _very discerning_ people of Otaheite; but
now, she came to Bougainville, her face covered with tears, and
confessed it, giving a history of herself, and an explanation of her
reasons for undertaking so romantic an expedition. "She will be the
first woman," says Bougainville, "that ever made such a voyage, and I
must do her the justice to affirm, that she always behaved on board with
the most scrupulous modesty. She was neither ugly nor handsome, and not
more than twenty-six or twenty-seven years of age. It must be owned,
that if the two ships had been wrecked on any uninhabited island in the
ocean, the fate of Bare would have been a very singular one." The idea
perhaps is scarcely susceptible of embellishment, but one may wonder,
that it never struck the fancy of a poet.

On the 29th of May, they lost sight of the land, which had so much but
so fruitlessly engaged their attention, and sailed westward with a very
fresh south-east wind. This brought them on the 4th June, to a low flat
island, surrounded, by a dangerous shoal, to which with little courtesy,
perhaps, to the goddess, was given the name of the Shoal of Diana. A
sand-bank and breakers were discovered on the 6th, and indicated such a
dangerous navigation, that Bougainville immediately resolved on altering
his course, which he did by steering N.E. by N., abandoning entirely his
scheme of proceeding westward, in the latitude of 15 deg.. He justifies this
conduct by the reflection, that though he had persevered in his original
intention, he must have reached the eastern coast of New Holland, which,
estimating it by what Dampier ascertained of the western coast, would
have proved both unimportant and inhospitable. The judicious reader,
however, will allow far greater weight to the circumstances of his
deficiency for an uncertain navigation, than to such hypothetical
reasoning. He had only bread for two months, and pulse for forty days;
and his salt meat had become so bad, that the crew preferred the rats to
it, whenever they were fortunate enough to catch them.

The S.E. wind unluckily failing them, their course from the 7th made
good, was only N. by E., when on the 10th at day-break, land was seen,
bearing from E. to N.W., a delicious smell having previously intimated
its vicinity. This was off the N.E. coast of New Holland, the passage
betwixt which and New Britain, Bougainville mistook for a deep gulph or
bay, and which of course he had the utmost difficulty to get clear of,
with an unfavourable wind, very bad weather, and a great south-eastern
swell. This mistake seems to have occasioned him more danger and much
greater hardships than had yet been experienced. To this imaginary
gulph, Bougainville gave the name of Gulph of the Louisiade, and that of
Cape Deliverance to its N. or N.N.E. extremity, which he doubled after
no less than a fortnight spent in extreme peril and continual fears. In
the morning of the 28th, when about sixty leagues to the northward of
this cape, and steering N.E. on the coast of New Britain, he discovered
land to the N.W. nine or ten leagues off. This proved to be two isles,
and about the same time there appeared a long high coast, extending to
the northward for some distance, and then turning to N.N.W. His
situation was extremely hazardous among these lands, to him altogether
unknown, often surrounded with dangerous shoals, and his boats, which
were occasionally sent out to sound, being sometimes beset by the
natives. It was not till the 5th of July, that he succeeded in finding
any thing like safe anchorage, which he at last effected in Carteret's
Harbour, or, as he calls it, Port Praslin. It was here, as we have
elsewhere related, that he found some vestiges of the Swallow's
residence a short time before. The situation was far from yielding the
advantages so much longed for; no refreshments could be procured for the
sick, and scarcely any thing solid for the healthy. The miseries of
famine stared them in the face, and the delay occasioned by the
necessity of repairing the vessels, and the wretched state of the
weather, aggravated their sufferings in the highest degree. At last, on
the evening of the 24th, a breeze springing up from the bottom of the
harbour, enabled them, with the help of the boats, to get out to sea,
when they steered from E. by S. to N.N.E., turning to northward with the
land. The longitude was corrected by observation on leaving Port
Praslin, which gave a difference of about 3 deg., the reckoning being to the
eastward.

Bougainville now coasted New Britain for some time, passing betwixt it
and a series of islands, on which he bestowed the names of his principal
officers. The sufferings of the crew for want of proper and sufficient
victuals, were now extreme; but no one, we are told, was dejected or
altogether lost patience. On the contrary, it was quite usual for both
officers and men to dance in the evenings, as if in a time of the
greatest ease and plenty. Such recreation, one may most certainly infer
from Bougainville's own words, must soon have been performed very
languidly, and in a little time longer ceased entirely; for it became
necessary to shorten even the small allowance of food, which, repeated
attempts at landing on different shores failed to augment, and the
quality of the provisions too, was such, as in the emphatic language of
Bougainville, rendered those the hardest moments of the sad days they
passed, when the bell gave notice to receive the disgusting and
unwholesome fare. The scurvy also made fearful impression on them after
leaving Port Praslin; no one could be said to be quite free from it,
and half of the ships' companies could not do duty. But such misery was
now near a termination, for having navigated, with several nautical
difficulties, a strait formed by the Papou Isles denominated _Passage
des Francois_, the ships came to an anchor on the last day of August, in
Cajeli Bay, on the coast of the island Boero, where there was a Dutch
settlement, and where provisions of an excellent sort, and the necessary
refreshments, were got in abundance. The effects of such a favourable
change were most speedy and obvious, so that in the course of six days,
all things were ready for prosecuting the voyage. Bougainville therefore
left Boero on the 7th September, and steered successively N.E. by N. and
N.N.E in order to clear the guiph of Cajeli. Having accomplished this,
he directed his course through the straits of Bouton, of which, and of
the adjacent coasts, he has given a tolerably minute description,
useful, it is likely, to mariners. After this, he got sight of the high
lands of the island Saleyer, on the 18th September, and passed the
strait betwixt it and the island of Celebes. On the 21st, he got sight
of the isles Alambia, the position of which, as of several other
interesting points in this navigation, it is candidly admitted, is very
inaccurately laid down in the common French charts; but Bougainville
takes the opportunity, which, it is believed, no one will grudge, of
paying a tribute of commendation to the labours and worth of D'Anville.
His map of Asia, he says, published in 1752, gave him the greatest
assistance, and is very good from Ceram to the isles of Alambia,
Bougainville having verified his positions in this navigation. He adds,
"I do this justice to M. D'Anville's work with pleasure; I knew him
intimately, and he appeared to me to be as good a member of society as
he was a critic and a man of erudition." Bougainville now kept along the
shore of Java, and after being out at sea for ten months and a half,
arrived at Batavia on the 28th of September.

After the account we have already given of Batavia in this volume, it
would be quite unnecessary to notice what Bougainville says of it. We
shall only mention that his experience of its unhealthiness was such, as
made him use all imaginable expedition to leave it, in order to save the
lives of his people, who were reduced to a most deplorable state of
health. What Captain Cook says of his old sail-makers is somewhat
paralleled by what Bougainville relates of the effect of the novelties
of Batavia on the Otaheitan man Aotourou, in keeping him so highly and
constantly excited, as for long to preserve him from the prevailing
illnesses. At last, we are told, the poor fellow fell sick, and it is
mentioned, evidently in praise of his docility, that he became as good a
swallower of physic, as a man born in Paris! The inference from this is
somewhat dubious, but not to be sceptical, _valeat quantum valere
potest_. Aotourou's remembrance of the evils of Batavia was such, as
prompted him, whenever he named it, to call it, in the language of his
country, _enoua mate_, "the land which kills."

It was the 16th October when Bougainville quitted Batavia, on the 19th
he cleared the straits of Sunda, and in little more than a fortnight
afterwards, he came in sight of the Isle of France, where he found it
necessary to put in, to have the frigate hove down and repaired, and to
procure refreshments for his voyage home. Having accomplished these
objects, he set sail on the 12th December, leaving the Etoile there to
be careened, as his junction with her was no longer needed for either
vessel. On touching at the Cape of Good Hope, he learned, as is
elsewhere mentioned, that Captain Carteret was eleven days before him.
This, however, owing to the state of the Swallow, was an inconsiderable
advantage, and soon ceased to exist. The particulars of the meeting
which took place betwixt that vessel and Bougainville's, have been
related in our account of Carteret's voyage, to which the reader is
referred.

On the 4th of March, Bougainville got sight of the isle of Tereera, on
the 14th of Ushant, and on the 16th entered the port of St Maloes, after
a voyage of two years and four months.

END OF THE THIRTEENTH VOLUME.