COOK IN "ENDEAVOUR" 91 



I am not prepared to admit the justice of the contemptuous 

 allusions to Byron and Wallis. If the third person (mentioned 

 second in order) was Quiros, which his alleged reluctance to go 

 further than 20 south renders probable, it must be remembered 

 that Dahymple, when he wrote in 1770, was, like the rest of the 

 world, very imperfectly informed as to the proceedings of Quiros. 

 But whatever may have been the shortcomings of Quiros (?), 

 Byron and Wallis, to whom the book was pointedly NOT dedicated, 

 the description of the ideal navigator, the man after Dalrymple's 

 own heart, reads like a pen-portrait of Cook, who was even then, 

 while Dalrymple wrote with his pen steeped in gall, making the 

 great discoveries which the writer himself might have made if he 

 had been given the opportunity. After Cook's return Dalrymple 

 could not but admit the importance of his discoveries, but a ten- 

 dency towards bitterness may still be traced in his inclinations to 

 belittle the value of the passage between Australia and New Guinea 

 and the assertion that its discovery had been forestalled by Torres. 



