478 THE DISCOVERY OF AUSTRALIA 



that they should do ; for, like Burke, he believed that 

 a large part of wisdom is to know how much of the corrup- 

 tion of human nature it is wise to tolerate. 



Passion and And dominant in the centre of things was character. 



self-control, j^gg w h o sa ji ec j w ith him said that his nature was very 

 passionate. There are facts that illustrate this judgment ; 

 and on his last voyage he was guilty of actions which 

 one would like to forget. But the witness who records 

 these actions was himself amazed by them ; amazed, 

 because they stood in inexplicable contrast to his usual 

 conduct. In general, he ruled his passions with such- 

 apparent ease that one is tempted to wish that he had 

 been a trifle less virtuous. British seamen in those days 

 were still famous for what Mr. Forster, one of the scientific 

 gentlemen on the Resolution, called the dreadful " energy 

 of their language." Yet I do not remember that Cook 

 ever used a phrase above the average. And he had 

 his opportunities. What, for example, did he say when 

 he found that the islanders had stolen his stockings 

 from under his head while he was wide awake ? The 

 carnal man would like to know, but there is silence. We 

 look eagerly into his virtuous life for some small redeem- 

 ing vice. " Temperance in him," wrote Captain King, 

 who sailed in the last voyage, " was scarcely a virtue ; 

 so great was the indifference with which he submitted 

 to every kind of self-denial." Surgeon Sam well quarrels 

 with this statement. Cook, he says " had no repugnance 

 to good living ; he always kept a good table, though he 

 could bear the reverse without murmuring " ; a statement 

 which makes his virtue exceed the measure attributed 

 by King. His "austerity " was due, not to lack of capacity 

 for pleasure, but to perfection of moral self-control. 



A peasant Cook, to use Cromwell's phrase, was a man of a spirit, 



gentleman anc ^ *" s s P iri ^- was the spirit of the gentleman. In his 

 intercourse with men of high rank and great wealth, he 

 was always courteous, always dignified, not claiming 

 equality but assuming it. He was their equal and more 

 than their equal, not because he was a great British navi- 

 gator, but because he was a British gentleman. And he 



