100 FRENCH IN VAN DIEMEN's LAND. 



Pondiolierry as a base of operations.* He rejects New 

 Zealand and Van Dienien's Ijand as too remote ; and 

 after hesitating" for a while over Quiros' Terre du St. Esjirit 

 (the coast between Cooktown and Townsvillo), linally 

 inclines to New Britain as the must suitable locality. 

 ^^'ith a sagacious foresight, since ani])ly justiiied by events, 

 he declares that any colony planted in these regions would 

 hold Ariadne's clew for the whole Southern world. From 

 such a centre, every part of this new realm could in 

 time be explored and conquered, from the Equator to the 

 Antarctic Circle. He elaborately discusses the best means 

 of forming such a settlement, and recommends that after 

 its first establishment a certain number of convicts, male 

 and female, should be sent to it every year to supply the 

 necessary labour, and to be in time transformed from a 

 danger and burden to the State into industrious and 

 useful citizens. t Still fui'ther to strengthen the new 

 colony, he would de])ort to it, as free citizens, numbers of 

 foundlings, who are in a sense tlie property of the State 

 which has reared them, and can therefore dispose of them 

 at its pleasure. He warns his countrymen against the 

 danger of waiting until some other nation had proved the 

 ])racticability of a colony by trying the e.\j)eriment ; for 

 when once any nation has gained a foothold it will not 

 sutfei' another to share the tei'ritory to which it has thus 

 acquired a light by conquest..}: Although various dis- 

 covery expeditions were despatched from France to the 

 South Seas after the days of De Brosses, the President's 

 warning remained unheeded. France missed lier o])j)or- 

 tunity, and it was left to England to take the first step, 

 and found a new empire in the.se southern seas, from 

 wiiich — justifying the Frenchman's forecast — she did not 

 scruple from the very first peremptorily to warn off all 

 intruders. 



It was probably due to the fact of the coincidence of 

 Captain Cook's discoveries with the loss of the American 

 colonies, quite as much as to her naval supremacy, that 

 England chanced to be beforehand with her lival. It 

 takes an effort of imagination t«) realise the New A\^orld 

 which Cook revealed, and how he o))cned up to men's 

 minds the possibilities and promise of the new field for 

 enterprise. Until his time, New Holland — for as yet 



" Nav. aii.\ Tcrrcs Aust., ii., 307, ct scq. t Tbid.^ i., 28, ct .seq. 



J IhU., ii., -108. 



