204 Memoir of Charles Alexander Lesueur. 



are an enduring evidence of what may be done by resolute minds 

 under every discouragement. What the naturalists effected, in 

 spite of similar obstacles, shall be related hereafter. 



There was one part of Captain Baudin's deportment which is 

 inexplicable, and that was his total disregard of those sanitary 

 instructions, which had been prepared for him by order of the 

 government, especially in reference to means of preventing that 

 dreadful disease, the scurvy. The conduct of Captain Flinders, 

 on this head, affords a striking contrast. Both were engaged in 

 similar explorations in the same seas ; both put into Port Jackson 

 for supplies the same season : the crew of one reduced to the ex- 

 tremity of misery by sickness and want, that of the other in such 

 a state of health — every ma| doing duty upon deck — that their 

 vigor was the subject of general observation.* 



The Geographe remained at the Isle of France upwards of four 

 months; and then proceeded homeward. She stopped at the 

 Cape of Good Hope on the 3d of January, 1804. The object of 

 this visit was twofold : to procure fresh provisions, and to take 

 on board for the menagery of the Museum of Paris, some of the 

 rare animals that are indigenous to southern Africa. 



While at the Cape, Peron and Lesueur, the last of the zoolo- 

 gists of the expedition, being solicitous of obtaining exact knowl- 

 edge on the subject of that anomaly in physiology, the Tablier, 

 reported as characteristic of the females of a race of the natives 

 of southern Africa ; the governor-general, M. de Janssens, and 

 the chief physician of the colony, Raynier de Klerk Dibbetz, lent 

 all the assistance in their power to this end ; and the results of 

 their investigations were of a more definite character than those 

 furnished by preceding travellers. This curious organ or ap- 

 pendage, it seems, belongs exclusively to the tribe named Hoits- 

 waana or Borchisman ; and is never observed in the Hottentots, 

 properly so called. It is visible in infancy ; and increases in size 

 with the growth of the body. It disappears by the crossing of 

 the Houswaana with other races.f 



* There was not a single individual on board who was not upon deck, workin 

 the ship into harbor; and it may be averred that the officers and crew were, gen- 

 erally speaking, in better health than on tb day we sailed from Spithcad, and not 

 in 1 tod spirits. — A V rage to Terra Austra/is, vol. i. p. 226, 4 . 



t Dr. Aland, in hie Historical Eulogy of P&ron, thus speaks of the Tablier: "D e " 

 puis long-temps le tablier natural attribue aux femmes hottentotes, etail Fobjet d< 

 raisonneiiKMiis dea physicians d'Europe dee relations enntradictoires des voy em- 



eet organe singulier n'est ni un repli de la peau du bas centre, conime on le croyait 

 autrefois, ni un prolongement des grandes lerres, oomme Fa dit recemment Barn^v 



mais bien qn'il est \\\\ ndice particulier tenant par un pedi.ule a la rommi-ure 



8U] rieure des grandes levrw, 6largi -ant et se divisant par le bas en deux branches 



"ux pendent d'ordinaire, mais qu'on pent ecarter, dormant ainsi k cette partie une 

 gure triai ulaire. II recommit que cet organe se trouve Fattribut general et Yun 

 <les caracteres distinct ifs d'une certaine nation sauvage et cnielle, connue des Hol- 





