Xl INTRODUCTION. 



accommodation of shipping ; and it must have heen 

 previous to 1756 that a regular establishment was 

 formed for the preservation of turtles to supply 

 the He de France and Bourbon with such fresh 

 provision. 



" This fishery", wrote Mr. Charles F. Noble' (allud- 

 ing to the sea-turtles), in that year, 1756, "is 

 thought so useful at Mauritius, that they have 

 always a sergeant's party on that little island of 

 Eodriguez, who collect all the fish they can, for the 

 boats that are sent to bring them at certaui times, 

 and the ships that generally touched there on their 

 way to Mauritius. There is, also, a particular spot 

 of ground inclosed here, for keeping and breeding- 

 land tortoises for the same purposes." 



It was in the year 1671, that, on Thursday, 28th 

 of May, the first scientific observer. Abbe Pingre, 

 accompanied by his assistant, M. Thuillier — " un 

 jeune homme tres verse dans la haute geometrie, 

 et initie dans la theorie et dans la pratique de I'as- 

 tronomie" — set foot on shore in the isle desiree of 

 Rodriguez. The expedition had left L'Orient in 

 January, on board the French East India Com- 

 pany's ship Le Comte d' Argeiison, arriving at Mau- 

 ritius on the 7th of May, where the news of the 

 capture of Pondicherry had just reached. M. Le 

 Gentil had embarked two months previously at 

 Port Louis for the above-named Indian port, which 



1 Vide " Some Rpmarks made at the French Islands of Mauritius 

 and Bourbon, 1755, by Charles F. Noble, to Governor Pigot at 

 Madras." (Dalrymple's Oriental Repository.) 



