THE BANKSIAN BOTANIST-LIBRARIANS. 
103 
group called the Company’s Islands in the chart, the shores of Melville Bay, of 
Caledon Bay, and a small part of Arnhem Bay were also examined. 
We then left the coast, owing to the decayed state of the ship, which, on our 
return to Port Jackson, was surveyed and pronounced unfit for the prosecution 
of the voyage. 
Captain Flinders having, in consequence of this, determined to repair immedi- 
ately to England, for the purpose of obtaining another vessel to complete the 
objects of the expedition, Mr. Bauer and myself agreed to remain in the colony 
of New South Wales, until his return, or, if that should not take place, for a period 
not exceeding eighteen months. During this time we added very considerably 
to our collections of plants, within the limits of the colony of Port Jackson and 
its dependent settlements ; the banks of the principal rivers, and some parts of 
the mountains bounding the colony were examined ; I visited also the north and 
south extremities of Van Diemen’s Land, remaining several months in the vicinity 
of the river Derwent; and repeatedly landed on Kent’s Islands, in Bass Strait, 
on the shores of which the principal part of the sul)inarine Algae contained in our 
coUeetions were found.* 
A brief accoimt of Flinders’ three voyages of circumnavigation, 
two of them performed in the “ Investigator,” with Brown on board, 
is given below (p. 203), when speaking of Flinders. 
I’linders’ first Australian voyage began when he left Spithead, 18th 
July, 1801. He worked from the Leeuwin along the south coast, 
and reached Port Jackson 9th May, 1802. 
The second voyage began at Port .Jackson 22nd July, 1802. He 
went north along the Queensland coast, surveyed the Gulf of Carpen- 
taria with thoroughness, and finding his ship rotten made for Timor, 
31st March, 1803, and returned via West and South Australia to Port 
Jackson on 9th June, 1803, Peter Good, Brown’s assistant, dying a 
few days later. 
When Flinders left for England in the “ Porpoise,” wrecked at 
Wreck Reef, Brown remained behind to prosecute his researches. 
Following are a few letters bearing on the above period ; — 
Brown writes to Banks from Sydney, 0th August, 1803,t giving 
an account of his various collecting grounds and the various difficulties 
he had experienced in collecting and preserving his specimens. He 
reports the death of Peter Good.J His letter is an important one, 
as showing the progress of his researches. 
It would appear that he did not receive very much assistance from 
Flinders in the preservation of his collections. Brown again refers 
to this subject, in even stronger language, in a letter to the Rt. Hon. 
C. F. Greville of the same date,§ in which he gives much the same 
information as is contained in the letter to Banks. 
Many of Brown’s collections were on board when Lieut. Fowler 
(with Flinders on board) lost the “ Porpoise ” on a coral reef (Wreck 
* Flinders’ ■' Voyage to Terr,a .-Vustralis,'’ vol. ii, Appetuli.'c, p. 5-34. 
t Hist. Rec., V, 180. 
j Infra, p. 126. 
§ Ib., p. 185. 
