INTRODUCTION. xv" 



Diemen's Land, from whence Tafman took his departure, 

 was not above fifty-five leagues. It was highly probable, 

 therefore, that they were conne6led ; though Captain Cook 

 cautioufly fays, that he could not determine ivhether his New South 

 Wales, that is, the Eaft Coaft of New Holland, joins to Van 

 Diemen's Land, or m^. But what was thus left undetermined 

 by the operations of his firft voyage, was, in the courfe of 

 his fecond, foon cleared up ; Captain Furneaux, in the Ad- 

 venture, during his feparation from the Refolufion (a for- 

 tunate feparation as it thus turned out) in 1773, having ex- 

 plored Van Diemen's Land, from its Southern point, along 

 the Eaft coaft, far beyond Tafman's ftation, and on to the 

 latitude 38°, where Captain Cook's examination of it in 1770 

 had commenced f. 



It is no longer, therefore, a doubt, that we have now a 

 full knowledge of the whole circumference of this vaft 

 body ot land, this fifth part of the world (if I may fo fpeak), 

 which our late voyages have difcovered to be of fo amazing 

 a magnitude, that, to ufe Captain Cook's words, it is of a 

 larger extent than any other country in the known ivorld^ that does 

 not bear the name of a continent J. 



4. Tafman having entered the Pacific Ocean, after leav- 

 ing Van Diemen's Land, had fallen in with a coaft to which 

 he gave the name of New Zealand, The extent of this 

 coaft, and its pofition in any dire<5lion but a part of its Weft 

 fide, which he failed along in his courfe Northward, being 

 left abfolutely unknown, it had been a favourite opinion 

 amongft geographers, fince his time, that New Zealand was 



* Hawkefworth, Vol. iii. p. 483. 



\ Cook's Voyage, Vol. i, p. 114, ^ 



J; Hawefworth, Vol. iii. p. 622. 



1. 



a part 



