INTRODUCTION. 
The Voyages which had been made, during the seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries, by Dutch and by English navigators, had 
successively brought to light various extensive coasts in the southern 
hemisphere, which were thought to be united ; and to comprise a 
land, which must be nearly equal in magnitude to the whole of 
Europe. To this land, though known to be separated from all 
other great portions of the globe, geographers were disposed to 
give the appellation of Continent : but doubts still existed, of the 
continuity of its widely extended shores ; and it was urged, that, as 
our knowledge of some parts was not founded upon well authenti- 
cated information, and we were in total ignorance of some others, 
these coasts might, instead of forming one great land, be no other 
than parts of different large islands. 
The establishment, in 1788, of a British colony on the easternmost, 
and last discovered, of these new regions, had added that degree of 
interest to the question of their continuity, which a mother country 
takes in favour, even, of her outcast children, to know the form, 
extent, and general nature of the land, where they may be placed. 
The question had, therefore, ceased to be one in which geography 
was alone concerned : it claimed the paternal consideration of the 
father of all his people, and the interests of the national commerce 
seconded the call for investigation. 
VOL. 1. B 
