Terre Napoleon

éron, and Freycinet as to whether the

ent corroborate

of Freycinet

ing what Péron and Frey

ave escaped the notice of writers on Australian history. The contradictions are not observed in Bonwick's Port Phillip Settlement, in Rusden's Discovery, Survey, and Settlement of Port Phillip, in Shill

he following terms, which it is worth while to compare with those used by him in his book, quoted above: "Captain Baudin informed me that after parting with the Naturaliste in the Strait, in a heavy gale, he had had fine weather, and had kept the coast close on board from Westernport to the place of meeting, but that he had found no bay or place where a vessel could anchor, the coast having but few bights in it, and those affording

T OF ENTRANCE

ONG the page, he will look at it very much as it is regarded from a ship at sea.* (* A reduced copy of the Admiralty chart of the entrance (1907) is prefixed to this chapter. The reader can perform the experiment with that.) It will be noticed that a clear view into the port, except from a particular angle, is blocked by the land on the eastern side (Point Nepean) overlapping the tongue of land just inside the port on the western side (Shortland's Bluff). Not until a vessel stands fairly close and opposite to the entrance, so that the two lighthouses on the western side, at Queenscliff, "open out," can the passage be discerned.* (* Ferguson, Sailing Directions for Port Phillip, 1854--he was harbour-master at the time--says (page 9): "Vessels having passed Cape Schanck should keep a good offing in running down towards the entrance until they open out the lighthouses, WHICH ARE NOT SEEN BEFORE BEARING NORTH 1/2 EAST OWING TO THE HIGH LAND OF POINT NEPEAN INTERVENING." Findley, Navigation of the South Pacific Ocean, 1863, has a remark about t

ween Cape Schanck on the eastern side of Port Phillip heads, and Cape Roadknight on the western side--the port was seen and its contours were distinguished from the masthead.* (* The matter is sufficiently important to justify the quotation of the passages in which Péron and Freycinet recorded the alleged observation, and these are given at length in Appendix A to this chapter.) Péron did not say that he saw it himself. H

urs from the masthead quite another. To do the first was quite possible, though not, as will be shown, from any part of the route indicat

p conflict of evidence. We mus

h. Frankness, too, was an engaging characteristic of Baudin throughout. He was evidently proud of what his expedition had already done, and was, as Flinders wrote, "communicative." Had he discovered a new harbour, he would have spoken about it jubilantly. Moreover, a

ce, who would have been quick to correct his chief in the event of a misapprehension. Flinders so far relied on Baudin's statement that when, on April 26, he sighted Port Phillip heads himself, he thought he was off Westernport, which his friend George Bass had discovered in 1798. "It was the information of Captain Baudin which induced this sup

, in which he gave an account of his voyage up to date.* (* Printed in the Moniteur, 22 Fructidor, Revolutionary Year 11. (September 9, 1803).) Ther

surely these were the most negligent explorers who ever sailed the seas.* (* It is true that Cook did not enter Port Jackson when he discovered and named it on May 6, 1770. But exploration, it must always be remembered, was not the primary object of the voyage of the Endeavour, as it was of Le Geographe. Cook, when he achieved the greatest extent of maritime discovery made at one time by any navigator in history, was simply on his way homeward from a visit to Tahiti, the primary purpose of which was to enable astronomers to observe the transit of Venus. Cook, too,

irmed by five documents, the te

of Paris, not of Greenwich.) The situation when the entry was made, presumably at noon, was about midway between Lorne and Apollo Bay, off the coast leading down in a south-westerly direction to Cape Otway. The winds were east, east-north-east, south-east, and east-south-east; weather very fine; a fresh wind blowing ("joli frais; beau temps"). It was the wind which was hindering Flind

d of a latitudinal and longitudinal reading between these points. That is to say, the position of Port Phillip is not indicated at all. In this case also the column for "Remarques" is blank. Can we believe that if the port had been observed, no attempt would have been made to fix the situation of it? The latitudes and longit

ind. These coast sketches, like narrow ribbons, prettily tinted, were done from the deck of the ship, and represented the aspect of the shore-line from seaward. The coasts of Bass Strait were duly represented, but there was a gap between the Schanck and the Otway sides of Port Phillip. Why? Obvi

Freycinet was Baudin's first lieutenant on Le Geographe. If Port Phillip was seen from that ship on March 30, he should have seen it if Baudin did not. If the captain was ill, or asleep, Henri de Freycinet would be in charge.

27 Thermidor, Revolutionary Year 11 (August 15, 1803).) Referring to Baudin's voyage along the "entierement inconnues" southern coasts of Australia, the article said that he first visited Wilson's Promontory (which it called Cap Wilson), and then

ersed. His general plan, when describing coasts with which he had no personal acquaintance, was to acknowledge in footnotes the particular persons on whose notes he relied for his descriptions. But it is a singular circumstance that when he came to describe this part of the coast of Terre Napoleon, and to repeat, with an addition, Péron's statement that Port Phillip was seen on March 30, he gave no footnote or reference. In w

ot there. He says: "Nous en avons observe l'entree." That is more than Péron, who was there, had claimed. If the "entrance" to Port Phillip was "observed" on March 30, still more incomprehen

e words which one can use are, as Boileau said, "in the dictionaries"; every writer selects and arranges them to suit his own ideas. But when Flinders said that the country around Port Phillip looked "pleasing and fertile," he had seen it to advantage. On May 1 he had climbed Station Peak, one of the You-Yang group of mountains, and saw stretched at his feet the rich Werribee Plains, the broad miles of fat pastures leading away to Mount Macedon, and the green rolling lands beyond Geelong, opening to the Victorian Western District. In May the kangaroo-grass would be high and waving, full of seed, a wealth of luxuriant herbage, the value of which Flinders, a country-bred boy, would be quick to appreciate. On the other side of the bay he had climbed Arthur's Seat at the back of Dromana, saw behind him the waters of Westernport which Bass had discovered, and traced the curve o

es to the headlands at the entrance to Port Phillip, which are now known as Point Lonsdale and Point Nepean. If they saw the entrance on March 30, why did they lose the opportunity of honouring two more of their distinguished countrymen, as they had done in naming Cap Richelieu (Schanck), Cap Desaix (Otway), Cap Montaigne (Nelson), Cap Volney (Moonlight Head), and so many other features of the coast? It is singular that while they named some capes that do no

d. How did they get there? It was not even pretended in the history of the voyage that Le Geographe went inside the heads. But see how the story grew: (a) Baudin saw no port; (b) Péron says the port was seen

ographe, From Freyci

e is indicated by dots a

shes only ---------- i

t to Flinders was perfectly true, and that the assertions of Péron and Freycinet which, if veracious, would make Le Geographe the s

ter part of her course across the so-called Baie Talleyrand she was much farther from the land than that. On no part of her course would it have been possible for a person at the masthead to see either the entrance to Port Phillip or any part of the port itself. It shows that the ship, while steering across from Cape Schanck in the direction of Cape Otway, diverted a few miles to the north-west, and then abruptly turned south-west.

n opinion already adequately supported, the writer showed two large photographed copies of two of Freycinet's charts to an experienced member of the pilot service, and asked him whether it would have been possible for Port Phillip to be seen from the situation indicated, or anywhere in the vicinity, under any conceivable conditions. He at once replied that it was utterly impossible.* (* Indeed, he promptly said, in the direct, emphatic speech which is the special privilege of sailors:

n, d'ou il prit son point de depart, et s'avanca vers l'ouest en suivant la cote jusqu'a la distance de 15 degres de longitude.") Was there some confusion in Péron's mind as to what port was seen? Unquestionably Le Geographe did sight Westernport. Was it originally Baudin's intention to ignore Bass's discovery of 1798, and, giving a French name to every feature of the coast in Terre Napoleon, to call Westernport "Port du Debut"? That would not have been an appropriate name for Port Phillip had it really been seen on the morning of March 30, as it most certainly was not. But, it being determined to denominate the land between

make of the statements

d. I do not hear that his countrymen are well satisfied with his proceedings" (June 1805). Finally it was determined to issue a history of the expedition; but to have published any charts without showing Port Phillip would have been to make failure look ridiculous. By this time Freycinet, who was preparing the charts, knew of the existence of the port. The facts drive to the conclusion that the French had

END

tte en avant, et forme l'entree d'une baie profonde, que nous nommames Baie Talleyrand. Sur la cote orientale de cette baie, et presque vers son fond, se trouve un port, dont on distinguoit assez bien les contours du haut des mats; nous le designames sous le nom de Port du Debut; mais ayant appris dans la suit

te. Nous en avons observe l'entree le 30 mars 1802, sans toutefois penetrer dans son interieur. Les Anglois, qui l'ont examine avec details, lui ont donne le nom de Port Phillip en l'honneur du premier gouverneur de la coloni

END

and 110). Murray's was then at the Admiralty; it is now in the Public Record Office. That of Flinders was placed at the disposal of Labilliere by the distinguished grandson of the explorer, Professor Flinders Petrie, whose great work in revealing to u

half, he wrote: "With closer examination of my own, and going often to the masthead, I saw that the reef did nearly stretch across the whole way, but inside saw a fine sheet of smooth water of great extent. From the wind blowing on this shore, and fresh, I was obliged to haul off und

e. Still, however, I entertained but little hopes of finding a passage sufficiently deep for a ship, and the bearings of the entrance prevented me from thinking it the west entrance into Westernport." In the journal, as in the report to the Admiralty, and, twelve years later, in his book, Flinders wrote that it was what Baudin told him