VOYAGE OF THE ROEBUCK 325 



the usual Dutch route, and on the 3ist of July, like so 

 many Dutch skippers, he saw land in the neighbourhood 

 of Houtman's Abrolhos. 



His plan had been to " coast round " New Holland. The plan 

 There were now two ways of doing so. He might sail ^vigate 1 " 

 Southward and then Eastward, following the line of Australia, 

 the discovery of De Nuyts, connecting it with Tasman's 

 discovery of Van Diemen Land, and then connecting 

 this with Tasman's discoveries in New Guinea. Had 

 he taken this route he might have been first to sail through 

 Bass's Strait, first to coast 'Eastern Australia, second to 

 sail through Torres Strait. But it was midwinter, and 

 the voyage seemed too cold for one who believed that 

 wealth was " directly under the sun." " I confess," 

 he writes, " I was not for spending any time more than 

 was necessary in the higher Latitudes ; as knowing that 

 the land there could not be so well worth the discovering 

 as the parts that lay nearer the line, and more directly 

 under the sun." He decided therefore to coast round 

 New Holland the other way ; " to coast along to the 

 Northward, and so to the East, and so thought to come 

 round by the South of Terra Australis (i.e. New Holland) 

 in my return back, which should be in the summer time 

 there." 



Dampier, therefore, sailed North, seeking "a Harbour Sharks Bay. 

 to refresh us after our tedious journey." He came to the 

 great bay behind Dirck Hartog's island, where Vlamingh 

 had caught sharks three years before. Dampier also 

 caught sharks, and called the place Sharks Bay. His 

 account of the place is similar to that which Vlamingh 

 gave three years before, and to that which Freycinet 

 gave one hundred and two years later. The sharks were 

 savoury, the raccoons (kangaroo rats?) were "very good 

 meat," and the turtles " indifferent sweet meat." The 

 bush flowers were beautiful and fragrant, and " for the 

 most part unlike any I had seen elsewhere " ; at last 

 one really good thing had been seen in Australia ! But 

 the country was waterless. They dug wells again and 

 again, but to no purpose. 



