APR. 1771 BOUGAINVILLE'S VOYAGE 431 



of our discoveries. Should the French have published an 

 account of Mr. De Bougainville's voyage before that of the 

 second Dolphin? how infallibly will they claim the discovery 

 of Cypre, or Otahite, as their own, and treat the Dolphin's 

 having seen it as a fiction, which we are enabled to set forth 

 with some show of truth, as the Endeavour really did see it, 

 a twelvemonth, however, after Mr. De Bougainville. If 

 England choose to assert her prior claim to it, as she may 

 hereafter do if the French settle, it may be productive of 

 very disagreeable consequences. 



1 i.e. the second voyage of the Dolphin, under Wallis (q.v. p. li.) No 

 important discoveries were made on the Dolphin's first voyage under Byron. 



