278 THE DISCOVERY OF AUSTRALIA 



mistook for heavy blunt parangs (i.e. knives for cutting 

 wood), and with their paddles, fell upon the men in the 

 cock-boat, and overcame them by main force, in which 

 fray three of our men were killed, and a fourth got mortally 

 wounded through the heavy blows. The quartermaster and 

 two sailors swam to our ship (the Heemskerk], whence we had 

 sent our pinnace to pick them up, which they got into alive. 

 After this outrageous and detestable crime, the murderers 

 sent the cock-boat adrift, having taken one of the dead 

 bodies into their prow, and thrown another into the sea." 



Murderers' The Dutch " diligently fired muskets and guns," but 

 the prows got away. So the Dutch named the place 

 " Murderers' Bay," and set sail, " seeing we could not hope 

 to enter into any friendly relations with those people, nor to 

 be able to get water or refreshments here." They decided 

 to sail Eastward along the coast in search of these things. 



Staten And what was this second land that had been discovered ? 



L^it part ' ^ seems >" wrote Tasman, "to be a very fine country, 



of the and we trust this is the mainland coast of the unknown 

 South-land." That is, he thought that New Zealand 

 was probably a Northern promontory of the great Southern 

 or Magellanican continent, which was still drawn on the 

 maps. Now in 1616, as we have seen, Le Maire sailing 

 on the East coast of Tierra del Fuego had seen a land 

 which is really a rather small island, but which he thought 

 was probably part of the Southern Continent, and he had 

 called it Statenlandt. The idea in Tasman's mind was 

 that Le Maire and he had discovered parts of the 

 same continent, and that it would therefore be well to 

 use the same name. " In honour of their High Mighti- 

 ness," he wrote," we gave to this land the name of Staten 

 Landt, since we deemed it quite possible that this land is 

 part of the great Staten Landt, though this is not certain." l 



1 Heeres, p. 118, writes : " The Statenland discovered by Tasman 

 had afterwards conferred on it the name of Nova Zeelandia or Nieuw 

 Zeeland. . . . The name was most probably given after the voyage 

 by Brouwer in 1643 had removed all doubts as regards the insular 

 character of the Statenland South of South America." The earliest 

 instance of Nova Zeelandia seems to be on Blaeu's Globe which Coote 

 dates 1647-1656. Cf. Heeres, p. 76. 



