EARLY DISCOVERIES. I3 



of the Gulf of Carpentaria. Another expedition sailed from Banda in April, 1629, con- 

 sisting of the yachts Klyn, Amsterdam and Wczd under Captain Gerrit Tomaz Pool, or 

 Poel, who was also murdered by the natives on the New Guinea Coast ; the subsequent 

 discoveries were prosecuted without any competent supervision, and after landing at a few 

 points of Arnhem's Land the ships returned nevertheless the complete examination of 

 the Gulf of Carpentaria was the outcome of this voyage. Thus were the western coasts 



A MALAY PROA IN THE GULF OF CARPENTARIA. 



mapped out, mainly in a rough and ready fashion, by the masters of the Dutch vessels 

 which on their way from Europe to the West Indies had been swept out of their 

 courses by storms, as well as by those who had made special voyages of discovery. 



The Commander of the Guide Zccpaard had in the meantime accidentally made the 

 south coast, and sailing along it for many hundreds of miles bestowed upon it the name 

 of Xuyts Land the Pieter Nuyts- associated with this voyage being, in the opinion of 

 R. H. Major, not the captain of the ship, but perhaps the Company's first merchant on 

 board. He was most likely a civilian, as Flinders notes that he was afterwards made 

 Governor of Formosa. Many other vessels, including the Mauritius, an outward bound 

 ship which appears to have made some discoveries upon the west coast in July, 1618, 

 the Viancn of De Witt, and the Batavia of Pelsart had also visited the Australian 

 Coast at various points, but all their reports were unfavourable, both with regard to the 

 nature of the country and the characteristics of the inhabitants. 



The visit of I'dsart, in 1629, is interesting from the fact that he was probably the 

 first of his countrymen to bring back to Europe anything like an authentic account of the 

 western coast of Australia. He sailed from Texel on the 28th of October, 1628, having 



