360 THE DISCOVERY OF AUSTRALIA 



French. De Brosses, writing in 1756, had bitterly com- 

 plained that Great Britain was " visibly affecting the 

 monarchy of the sea." When Callender wrote ten years 

 later, Great Britain had won the war, and her possession 

 of Sea Power was indisputable. Insolent is the victors' 

 triumph ! " Vain," writes Callender, " are the repeated 

 exhortations of the French writer, addressed to a nation 

 which is so far from being able to prosecute new discoveries 

 that they have been stripped by the late war of the best 

 foreign settlements they possessed ; and by the ruin 

 of their marine seem totally disabled at present to attempt 

 anything of moment in this way. Far other is the case 

 of this happy island. United among ourselves, respected 

 by foreigners, with our marine force entire, and (humanly 

 speaking) invincible, aided by a set of Naval officers 

 superior in every respect to those of the nations around 

 us, with a Sovereign on the throne who is filled with the 

 most ardent and laudable desire of seeing his native country 

 great and flourishing. These, I say, are incitements 

 that seem to render everything possible to Great Britain. 

 The extensive countries of the Terra Australis, hitherto 

 untouched, open to us a field worthy of our attention 

 in every respect." And Callender proceeds, with amazing 

 coolness, to steal every one of de Brosses' arguments and 

 to address them to his British readers. He thinks as 

 de Brosses had thought before him, and as Dampier 

 and Campbell had thought before de Brosses that the 

 best place for a settlement is New Britain, the island 

 discovered, he reminds his readers, by " our celebrated 

 navigator, Dampier." De Brosses had said that the 

 flourishing condition of the French East India Company 

 would enable it to found the colony. Well, the French 

 East India Company had now ceased to flourish, while 

 on the other hand the English East India Company, 

 after the deeds of Clive, will find it " easy to extend them- 

 selves into Australasia." The expedition should start 

 not from Pondicherry, but from Madras. Australasia, 

 argues Callender, must fall to Great Britain because Great 

 Britain possesses the Sea Power. And Callender was right. 



