THE PACIFIC OCEAN. 9 



partmenr. I had been under the like obhgations to him on >776. 



my fetting out upon my lafl voyage. Commiffioner Our- " «— -^ 



ry, with equal zeal for the fervice, gave us every afliftance 

 that we wanted from the naval yard. 



It could not but occur to us as a Angular and afFecT:ing 

 circumftance, that at the very inftant of our departure upon 

 a voyage, the objecft of which was to benefit Europe by 

 making frefli difcoveries in North America, there fliould be 

 the unhappy neceffity of employing others of his Majefty's 

 iliips, and of conveying numerous bodies of land forces, to 

 fecure the obedience of thofe parts of that continent which 

 had been dilcovered and fettled by our countrymen in the 

 laft century. On the 6ch, his Majeily's fliips Diamond, Am- Saturday 6. 

 bufcade, and Unicorn, with a fleet of tranfports, confifting 

 of fixty-two fail, bound to America, with the laft divifion of 

 the HefTian troops, and fome horfe, were forced into the 

 Sound by a ftrong North Weft Wind. 



On the 8th, I received, by exprefs, my inftrudions * for Monday 8. 

 the voyage, and an order to proceed to the Cape of Good 

 Hope with the Refolution. I was alfo direcfted to leave an 

 order for Captain Gierke to follow us, as foon as he fhould 

 join his fhip; he being, at this time, detained in London. 



Our firft difcoverers of the New World, and navigators of 

 the Indian and Pacific Oceans, were juftly thought to have 

 exerted fuch uncommon abilities, and to have accomplifhed 

 fuch perilous enterprizes, that their names have been hand- 

 ed down to pofterity as fo many Argonauts. Nay, even 

 the hulks of the fliips that carried them, though not con- 

 verted intoconftcllations in the Heavens, ufed to be honoured 

 and vifited as facred reliques upon earth. We, in the pre- 



* See the iBflrudlions, in the Introduftion, 



Vol. I. G fent 



