HISTORY OF ZOOLOGY IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA. 
PART II.— 1791-1829. 
B .y 
W. B. Alexander, M.A., 
Keeper of Biology in the W.A. Museum. 
(Read 13th July, 1915.) 
In a former paper 1 I brought together all the information as to 
the Zoology of Western Australia which had been gleaned by the 
Dutch and the Englishman, Dampier, up to the close of the 17th 
Century. 
During the 18th Century, very little further information as to 
the Fauna of our State was obtained. We know that some dozen 
ships visited our coast, but of these only two left any record of their 
observations, namely, those commanded by Vancouver and d’Entre- 
casteaux which visited our south coast in the last decade of the 
century, and to which I shall refer shortly. 
Meanwhile, however, the famous voyage of Captain Cook had 
revealed to the world the more fertile eastern shores of the con- 
tinent, and the discoveries of Sir Joseph Banks arid Dr. Solander 
at last drew the attention of scientists to the peculiarities of the 
fauna and flora of the new land. The fact that an altogether new 
type of mammal existed in Australia was emphasised by the intro- 
duction of the name kangaroo, though Banks did not give nearly 
such a complete description of the animal as Pelsart had done many 
years earlier. 
The settlers in Port Jackson soon began to collect and send to 
England specimens of the new and curious mammals, birds, fish and 
insects with which they met, and the general characteristics of the 
fauna of Australia rapidly became known to the scientific world. 
For a long time, however, no attempt was made to record from what 
part of the continent the specimens came, consequently most of the 
species described were recorded as from New Holland, and even up 
to the present time we are ignorant of the exact habitats of many 
of the New Holland insects collected in the period with which 1 
propose now to deal. 
In the year 1791, Captain George Vancouver, in command of: 
H.M.SS. “Discovery” and “Chatham,” passed along the south coast 
of Australia on his way to the Pacific Ocean. On September 28th 
he discovered a fine harbour which he called King George the Third 
Sound, and on the following day ( i a small, high island was called 
Seal lsland, being a great resort of those animals.” The two ships 
1 Journal of Nat. Hist, and Sci. Soc. of W.A., Vol. V. 
