The great quantity of plants collected here by Mr. Banks induced Cook to give it the name of Botany Bay. The King's colours were hoisted each day of the stay, and the ship's name with the date of the year was inscribed upon one of the trees near the watering place.

Having now provided a supply of fresh water, the anchor was weighed on the 6th of May, and they sailed northward. Unaware of what he had missed, Cook passed the entrance of Port Jackson, and followed up the coast for over a thousand miles to the north, without incident or adventure, beyond the routine work of the ship. But, on June 10th, this quiet was rudely broken by the ENDEAVOUR running on a coral reef when off the site of the present town of Cooktown. Fortunately a jagged point of coral stuck in the hole made, and acted as a plug, otherwise this voyage of Cook's would have proved his last, and the history of this continent been much delayed and altered.

Passing a sail under the hull, and throwing guns and other stores overboard, Cook got his ship once more afloat, and took her into the mouth of a river (now the Endeavour River) where, on a convenient beach, she was careened, and the carpenters set to work to repair her, whilst a forge was set up, and the smiths occupied making bolts and nails. Many animals strange to them were seen, and among them the first kangaroo. One of the firemen who had been rambling in the woods, told them, on his return, that he verily believed he had seen the devil.

"We naturally enquired in what form he had appeared, and his answer was in so singular a style, that I shall set it down in his own words. 'He was,' says John, 'as large as a one gallon keg, and very like it; he had horns and wings, yet he crept so slowly through the grass that if I had not been afeared, I might have touched him.' This formidable apparition we afterwards discovered to have been a bat. They have indeed no horns, but the fancy of a man who thought he saw the devil might easily supply that defect."

Many excursions Mr. Banks and the men made inland, finding one very useful plant, at the time when scurvy had appeared among them, a plant that in the West Indies is called Indian Kale, and served them for greens.

Some communication was established with the natives, but it ended as usual by their commencing to steal, and having to be chastised for it. In revenge they set fire to the grass, and the navigator very nearly lost his whole stock of gunpowder. He was astonished by the extreme inflammability of the grass and the consequent difficulty in putting it out, and vowed if ever he had to camp in such a situation again, he would first clear the grass around. Leaving the Endeavour River, Cook, after passing through the Barrier Reef and again repassing it, as he says, "After congratulating ourselves upon passing the reef we again congratulate ourselves upon repassing it," landed no more until he had left Cape York, and there on an island called "Possession Island," he formally took possession of the east coast of New Holland, under the name of New South Wales, for his Majesty King George III.

"AS I WAS ABOUT TO QUIT THE EASTERN COAST OF NEW HOLLAND, WHICH I HAD COASTED FROM LATITUDE 38 DEG. TO THIS PLACE, AND WHICH I AM CONFIDENT NO EUROPEAN HAD EVER SEEN BEFORE, I ONCE MORE HOISTED ENGLISH COLOURS, AND THOUGH I HAD ALREADY TAKEN POSSESSION OF SEVERAL PARTICULAR PARTS, I NOW TOOK POSSESSION OF THE WHOLE EASTERN COAST, FROM LATITUDE 38 DEG. TO THIS PLACE, LATITUDE 10 DEG. 30 MIN., IN RIGHT OF HIS MAJESTY KING GEORGE THE THIRD, BY THE NAME OF NEW SOUTH WALES, WITH ALL THE BAYS, HARBOURS, RIVERS, AND ISLANDS SITUATED UPON IT. WE THEN FIRED THREE VOLLEYS OF SMALL ARMS, WHICH WERE ANSWERED BY THE SAME NUMBER FROM THE SHIP."

This ceremony concluded, and rejoicing in the re-discovery of Torres Straits—the waters of which had borne no keel since the gallant Spaniard had passed through—he sailed to New Guinea, Cook having thus completed the survey of that portion of the South Land so long left a blank upon the map, never returned—unless his visit to Van Dieman's Land, in 1777, can be called a visit-to our shores, but the names he bestowed on the many bays, headlands, and islands of the east coast have clung to them ever since. So accurate were his surveys, even under extreme difficulties, that he left little for his successors to do but investigate those portions of the coast he had been forced to overlook.

But Cook's fame and career are such household words amongst all English-speaking races, and the results of his visit to Australia so extensive, that no space that this history could afford would be sufficiently large to appreciate the merits of his work.

When Phillip landed in Botany Bay he was followed, as is well known, by the distinguished French navigator, La Perouse, and although the name of this unfortunate man does not enter largely into the history of our colonisation, it is essential that it should come under notice. After a short stay, La Perouse sailed from Australian shores, and of him and his stately ships no tidings ever reached Europe. Years passed, and Captain Dillon, the master of an English vessel trading amongst the South Sea Islands, found a sword-belt in the possession of the natives; this led to further investigations, and the hapless story was finally elucidated.