1770. ROUND THE WORLD. 2S9 



tend however to no more merit in this part of the 

 voyage, than to have established the fact beyond all 

 controversy. 



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 Navigations aux Terres Australes," in his ac- 

 count of La Maire's voyage, has given a vocabulary 

 of the language that is spoken in an island near New 

 Britain, and we rind, 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 inha- 

 bitants of New Holland had a different origin, not- 

 withstanding the proximity of the countries. 



