1779.] RESULTS OF COOK's DISCOVERIES. 159 



ceded them in the exploration of the North Pacific : for, by deter- 

 mining accurately the positions of the principal points on the coasts 

 of Asia and America, bounding that sea, they first afforded the 

 means of ascertaining the extent of those continents, and the degree 

 of their proximity to each other, respecting which the most er- 

 roneous ideas had prevailed ; and the comparative ease and security 

 with which they executed this task, served to dispel apprehensions 

 with regard to expeditions through that quarter of the ocean. 



NOTE. — In the "Exploration du Territoire de l'Oregon, des Californies," &c, by 

 M. Duflotde Mofras, published at Paris, in the summer of 1844, by order of the king, 

 and under the auspices of Marshal Soult, the author asserts and assumes that he has 

 proved incontestably that the Columbia River had been discovered and explored com- 

 pletely by French officers and traders between 1716 and 1754, and that the whole 

 country traversed by that stream rightfully forms part of Canada. In support of the 

 latter assertion, he cites a passage from L'Escarbot's " Histoire de la Nouvelle France," 

 published in 1617, claiming, as New France, the whole American continent, and the 

 adjacent islands north of the tropic of Cancer; and a passage from the " Voyage de la 

 Nouvelle France," published in 1632 by Champlain, who is content with all north of 

 the 35th degree of latitude : and, in further confirmation, he refers to a manuscript Span- 

 ish map, drawn in Florence in 1606, to a Dutch map, drawn at Edam in 16] 0, and to an 

 English map, engraved at London in 1747, all of which, it seems, represent Canada as 

 extending to the Pacific. In proof that' the French had explored the Columbia regions, 

 M. de Mofras mentions a number of orders, preserved in the archives of the marine and 

 colonies at Paris, from French ministers, and from governors of Canada, for the exam- 

 ination of the western territories — one of which, addressed, in 1730, by the governor, 

 Beauharnois, to a trader named Verendrye, directs him " to send with his memoir 

 a map dratcnfrom his own observations and the indications of the Indians, and, among 

 others, of a Kree chief, embracing the course of the River of the West, and showing 

 that it must empty above California, near the entrance discovered by Martin de Agui- 

 lar." "Nothing can be more clear,'' adds M. de Mofras; it will, however, be ob- 

 served that the Swedish naturalist Kalm, who visited Canada in 1749, was informed 

 by Verendrye himself that " the chief intention of this expedition, viz., to come to 

 the South Sea, and to examine its distance from Canada, was not attained." 



"In fine," says M. de Mofras, (vol. ii. p. 254,) "the map accompanying the Me- 

 moires des Commissaires du Roi et de ceux de sa Majeste Britannique en Amerique, 

 engraved in 1757, demonstrates, also, that New France extended to the Pacific Ocean. 

 It will be seen, hereafter, that it is not surprising to find upon this map, in the 45th 

 degree of latitude, on the north-west coast of America, a great river, the direction of 

 which is exactly that of the River Columbia." Now M. de Mofras could not have 

 examined the map here cited by him when he made this assertion. The work con- 

 taining it is a collection of documents presented by the commissaries of France 

 and England, appointed, under the treaty of Aix la Chapelle, in 1748, to decide cer- 

 tain disputed points of boundary in America. The map of America, to which M. 

 Mofras refers, was drawn and presented by the French commissaries, as its title ex- 

 pressly declares, to expose the extravagant pretensions of the British to territories in 

 America: it does not contain the words "Canada" or "Nouvelle France," or any 

 other sign of French dominion ; the whole division of the continent, between the 

 48th and the 31st parallels of latitude, being represented by strong lines and express 

 notes, as included in the limits of the British provinces : nor does it show any large 

 river falling into the Pacific north of the peninsula of California, nor any river en- 

 tering that ocean north of the 36th degree of latitude. 



