In the year 1616 the Dutch ship Eendracht, commanded by Dirk Hartogs on her voyage from the Cape of Good Hope to Batavia unexpectedly touched at "divers islands, but uninhabited" and thus for the first time surveyed part of the west-coas of Australia[*]. As early as 1619 this coast, thus accidentally discovered, was known by the name of Eendrachtsland or Land van de Eendracht. The vaguenes of the knowledge respecting the coast-line then discovered, and its extent, is not unaptly illustrated in a small map of the world reproduced as below, and found in {Page x} GERARDI MERCATORIS Atlas sive Cosmographicae Meditationes de Fabrica mundi et fabricati figura. De novo...auctus studio JUDOCI HONDIJ (Amsterodami; Sumptibus Johannis Cloppenburgij. Anno 1632) [**]. If, however, we compare this map of the world with KEPPLER'S map of 1630 [***], we become aware that Hondius has not recorded all that was then known in Europe respecting the light which since 1616 European explorers had thrown on the question of the western coast-line of Australia. In Keppler's map, namely, besides the English discovery of the Trial rocks (1622) [****], and the name "'T Landt van Eendracht" in fat characters, passing from the north to the south, we meet with the following names, which the smaller letters show to have been intended to indicate subordinate parts of Eendrachtsland: Jac. Rommer Revier [*****], Dirck Hartogs ree, F. Houtmans aebrooleus and Dedells lant. What is more, Keppler's map also exhibits the south-west coast of Australia.
[* See on this point the Documents sub No. VII (pp. [8f.]).--It will hardly be denied that these pieces of evidence may justly be called "documents immediately describing" Hartogs's dicsovery.]
[** For my knowledge of this remarkable atlas I am indebted to Mr. ANTON MENSING, member of the firm of Messrs. Frederik Muller and Co., of Amsterdam. These gentlemen kindly enabled me to reproduce this chart for the present work. I received it too late to allow of its being placed among the charts accompanying the various documents.]
[*** See Chart No. 6 on p. [10] below.]
[**** See under No. XIII (p. [17]) below.]
[***** See on this point p. [54] infra (No. XXII A and note 3).]
No. 18. Typus orbis terrarum uit GERARDI MERCATORIS Atlas...De Novo...emendatus...studio JUDOCI HONDIJ, 1632.
Whence all those names? The answer to this question, and at the same time various other new features, are furnished by the chart of Hessel Gerritsz. of 1627 [*] and by the one dated 1618 [**], in which corrections have been introduced after date. The 1627 chart is specially interesting. Gerritsz., at the time cartographer in ordinary to the E.I.C., has "put together this chart of the Landt van d'Eendracht from the journals and drawings of the Steersmen", which means that he availed himself of authentic data [***]. He acquitted himself of the task to admiration, and has given a very lucid survey of the (accidental) discoveries made by the Dutch on the west-coast of Australia. In this chart of 1627 the Land of d'Eendracht takes up a good deal of space. To the north it is found bounded by the "Willemsrivier", discovered in July 1618 by the ship Mauritius, commanded by Willem Janszoon [****]. According to the chart this "river" is in about 21° 45' S. Lat., but there are no reliable data concerning this point. If we compare Hessel Gerritsz's chart with those on which about 1700 the results of Willem De Vlamingh's expedition of 1696-7 were recorded [*****] we readily come to the conclusion that the ship Mauritius must have been in the vicinity of Vlaming Head (N.W. Cape) on the Exmouth Gulf. From Willem Janszoon's statements it also appears that on this occasion in 22° an "island (was) discovered, and a landing effected." The island extended N.N.E. and S.S.W. on the west-side. The land-spit west of Exmouth Gulf may very possibly have been mistaken for an island. From this point then the Eendrachtsland of the old Dutch navigators begins to extend southward. To the question, how far it was held to extend, I answer that in the widest sense of the term ('t Land van Eendracht or the South-land, it reached as far as the South-coast, at all events past the Perth of our day) [******]. In a more restricted sense it extended to about 25° S.' Lat. In the latter sense it included the entrance to Shark Bay, afterwards entered by Dampier, and Dirk Hartogs island, likewise discovered by Dirk Hartogs.