Footnote 2: [(return)]
Perhaps Prince of Wales' islands are here alluded to, in lat. 15° 50' S. and long. 148° 5' W. about 40 marine leagues W.N.W. from Pernicious islands.E.
Footnote 3: [(return)]
By Arrowsmith, this island is placed in lat. 16° 32' S. and long. 148° 50' W. The longitude in the text is inexplicable on any supposition.E.
Footnote 4: [(return)]
The cloth of the South-sea islands is a substance in a great measure resembling paper, composed of the inner bark of the paper mulberry, the preparation of which will be afterwards detailed in the narratives of the modern circumnavigatorsE.
Footnote 5: [(return)]
We have here omitted a long, uninteresting, and inconclusive disquisition on the supposed Terra Australis, as altogether founded on supposition and error.E.
Footnote 6: [(return)]
These appear to have been the most northerly of the Society islands, about 70 marine leagues, or 3-1/2 degrees W. by N. from Recreation island, in lat. 15° 20' S. long. 152° W.
Footnote 7: [(return)]
There must be here an enormous error in the text; Coccos and Traitor's islands are almost directly west from Recreation island, and the northermost of the Society islands, supposed to be the Bowman's islands of the text, and not less than 23°10' farther west than these last, or 463 marine leagues, which could not well be run in less than a week or ten days.E.
Footnote 8: [(return)]
These were probably the Fee-jee, or Bligh's islands, in lat. 17° 20' S. long. 181° 30' W. but the narrative is too incomplete to ascertain this and many other points with any tolerable certainty.E.
SECTION VI.
Description of New Britain, and farther Continuation of the Voyage till the Arrival of Roggewein at Java.
The country of New Britain, and all the islands in its neighbourhood, is composed of very high land, many of the mountains hiding their heads in the clouds. The sea coasts are however both pleasant and fertile, the low lands being cloathed in perpetual verdure, and the hills covered with a variety of trees, mostly bearing fruit. It is in lat. between 4°and 7° S.[1] and both in regard to situation and appearance, no country can promise better than this. After some consultation, it was resolved to go on shore here at all events, though now so much reduced by the long-continued sickness, that they could hardly muster a sufficient number of men from both ships to man a boat, and leave men enough, in case they were cut off, to navigate one ship home, supposing them even to sacrifice one of the ships. Yet such was the ardent desire of all to get on shore, and so urgent was the necessity for that measure, that it appeared indispensable to venture on landing, let the consequences be what they might. Accordingly, our author was ordered into the boat, with as many men as could be spared, with orders to get on shore at any rate, by fair means if possible, and with the consent of the inhabitants, for whom he carried a great number of baubles to distribute among them as presents. If, however, these had no effect, he was then to use force, as the circumstances to which they were reduced made it as eligible to die by the hands of barbarians as to perish gradually by disease and famine.