The Casuarina, making all sail for Nepean Bay westward, sighted the leading ship in Investigator Strait. But Baudin did not wait even then. He kept Le Geographe on her course, under a full head of sail, without permitting the Casuarina to come up and report, or inquiring after the success of her work. The two ships soon lost sight of each other. Next day Baudin, evidently realising the enormity of his folly, veered round, and returned to Nepean Bay. But as the Casuarina had kept on westward during the night, in a frantic endeavour to catch her leader, the two vessels crossed far apart and out of vision. They did not meet again for fourteen days, when both lay at anchor in King George's Sound.
It is not wonderful that Freycinet confessed that he was "astonished" at Baudin's manoeuvres. They were scarcely those of a rational being, to say nothing of a commander responsible for the safety of two ships and the lives of their people. The company on the smaller vessel endured severe privations. They were reduced to a ration of three ounces of biscuit per man per day, and to a mere drink of water; and the ship herself sustained such severe damage from heavy seas that, said Freycinet, had he been delayed a few hours in reaching King George's Sound, he would have been compelled to run her ashore to prevent her from foundering. "Judge of the horror of my position," he wrote, and he certainly did not exaggerate when he used that term; for the coast along which he ran for safety is one of the most hopelessly barren in the whole world, offering to a stranded mariner neither sustenance, shelter, nor means of deliverance.
The only feature of much interest pertaining to the geographical work of the expedition in the region of the gulfs, is the high opinion formed by Péron of Port Lincoln--called Port Champagny on the Terre Napoleon charts. The port has not played a large part in the subsequent development of Australia, but Flinders, who discovered it and named it after the chief town of his native county, and the French of Baudin's expedition, who were the second people to enter it, thought very highly of its beauty and value. Péron spoke of it as a "magnificent port," in which all the navies of Europe could float, and concluded two pages of description with the words: "Worthy rival of Port Jackson, Port Lincoln is, in all respects, one of the finest in the world; and of all those which we have discovered [yet they had not discovered a single port of any kind!], whether to the south, the west, or the north of New Holland, it appears to be, I repeat, the best adapted to receive a European colony." After many years of settlement, Port Lincoln boasts of fewer than a thousand inhabitants; for though the glowing language of admiration concerning its beauty and convenience written by Flinders and Péron were fully justified, a back country too arid to support a large population has prevented it from attaining to great importance among the harbours of Australia. To the student of the history of exploration, however, Port Lincoln is interesting even beyond the measure of its beauty; for there, in 1841, Sir John Franklin, then governor of Tasmania, erected at his own cost a monument to the honour of Flinders, his old commander, from whom he imbibed that passion for exploration which was in due time to place his own name imperishably amongst the glorious company of great English seamen.
Péron himself experienced the cross-grained temper of the commander during the visit of the ships to Sharks Bay. This was the scene of Dampier's descent upon the Western Australian coast in 1699, in the rickety little Roebuck. It was here that his men dined off sharks' flesh, and "took care that no waste should be made of it, but thought it, as things stood, good entertainment."* The bay received from Dampier, on account of the feast, the name it has ever since borne. (* Dampier's men were unprejudiced in matters of gastronomy, but their taste in fish was not to their discredit. Shark's flesh, especially when young, is, there is reason to believe, excellent eating. During some weeks in a recent summer, when what we may term "orthodox" fish was scarce, a fashionable Australian sea-side hotel was regularly supplied with young shark--"gummy"--by a fisherman, for whose veracity the author can vouch. Neither proprietor, chef, nor guests knew what it was, and all were well fed and happy.)
Some of the French sailors who had been ashore returned in a wild state of alarm on account of giants whom they professed to have seen--men of extraordinary strength and stature, they reported, with long black beards, armed with enormous spears and shields, who ran at a furious pace, brandishing their weapons and giving utterance to fearful yells. "However extravagant these assertions might appear," said the incredulous naturalist, "it was necessary to collect precise information on the subject." The scientific Ulysses regarded the reputed Cyclops with a calculating scepticism. Had Polyphemus been at hand, Péron would have politely requested him to permit himself to be weighed and measured, and would have written an admirable monograph on his solitary optic.
There were, he considered, some reasons for thinking that a race of men of heroic proportions inhabited this western part of the continent. The Dutch captain, Vlaming, in 1697, had reported finding gigantic human footprints upon the banks of the Swan River, near where the city of Perth now stands; and two of Baudin's officers, whose names were not Munchausen and Sindbad but Heirisson and Moreau, declared that they also had observed the same phenomena at the same place. Péron set down these stories to the exaggerative distortion of lovers of the marvellous, "of whom we counted some amongst us." But when the sailors came scampering back to the ship with the tale that they had actually seen the giants and been pursued by them, the naturalist began to think that there was probably some ground for the belief. At all events, he determined to go and see for himself.
He requested Baudin to send a few armed men ashore with him, but was rudely refused. Not to be thwarted in continuing his researches in so favourable a place, Péron determined to make use of a couple of days during which a furnace was to be erected for extracting salt from the sea by evaporation--the ship's supply having been depleted--to run the risk of an excursion on his own account; whereupon Petit, one of the artists, and Guichenot, one of the gardeners, resolved to accompany him.
The adventurous three were soon favoured with a visit from a troop of aboriginals, who, though by no means giants, were certainly formidable foes. There were forty of them, all armed with spears. Péron and his companions, to defend themselves, had only a musket and a pair of pistols. The savages, terrible fellows, advanced with "clameurs terribles et menacantes." Retreat for the Frenchmen was impossible. A show of courage was the best policy; and the three, one of whom, Petit, had been "plein de terreur" when the blacks first made their appearance, put on a bold front and marched forward "avec assurance a leur rencontre." This bold tactical manoeuvre met with its deserved reward. The savages were visibly disconcerted. One of them made signs of invitation to a parley, but Péron considered it to be hazardous for one of the three to isolate himself from his companions. The trio continued to advance, resolved to sell their lives dearly if die they must. Such unexpected audacity threw the blacks into a state of uncertainty, and, after deliberating for a few moments, they turned their backs and went away, though slowly, and without the appearance of fear or disorder. Péron, Petit, and Guichenot, "to give the aboriginals a higher idea of our confidence and our courage," did not halt in their advance, but marched in the track of the retreating forty, who climbed to the height of a steep cliff and there continued to yell and gesticulate as though desiring to have conference with one of the white men. "After having responded for some time with similar cries and gestures"--Ulysses defying Polyphemus will recur to the mind--Péron and his companions concluded this signal display of coolness and daring by quietly walking back and proceeding on their journey inland. They were not pursued nor further molested.
Cool vision detracted from the gigantic stature of the Sharks Bay blacks as effectually as a cool demeanour disposed of the danger from them. The tallest man among them Péron declared to be no more than five feet four or five inches in height, and most of the forty were small sized, thin-limbed, and of feeble appearance. It is easy to perceive in this incident, where a disposition to exaggerate looking through the lens of fear, magnified a group of slight and slender savages into terrific giants, how many a legend has come to birth. The original sons of Anak would probably have been severely shortened of their inches had a Péron been available to bring illusion promptly to the test of measurement, and perhaps a scientific Jack the Giant Killer could have done deadly execution with a foot-rule.* (* It may be noted that Péron's researches regarding the physical proportions and capacities of savage races aroused much interest in France. The Moniteur of April 25 and June 23, 1808, published two long articles on "the physical force of savage people," founded upon Péron's writings and his records of comparative dynamometric data.)
The three adventurers suffered far more severely from the heat of the sun and the fatigues of working among thick bush and sand than from the natives of the country. They made a fine collection of specimens, and, congratulating themselves on their success, endeavoured to make their way back to the boat. But they soon realised that they were "bushed"--a term familiar enough to those who are acquainted with the story of Australian inland exploration. The country was covered with thick scrub, through which they endeavoured to make their way. The afternoon sun poured down a pitiless flood of heat, the white, glaring sand burnt their feet, the air in the Bush was stifling. It was as though they were walking through furnaces; and there were no spreading trees to relieve the ordeal by a touch of shade. They at length regained the shore, and trudged along the soft, hot sand; when Péron, exhausted after a walk of three hours, was compelled to throw aside the greater part of the collection which he had made at the expense of so much painful labour. Shortly afterwards Guichenot fell to the ground exhausted by hunger, thirst, and fatigue, and begged his companions to leave him there to die while they endeavoured to save themselves. Péron remembered a passage he had read in Cook's voyages about the reviving effect of a plunge in sea-water; and he and Petit tried it by wading in up to their necks. They assisted Guichenot to do the same, and revived him sufficiently to enable him to continue the weary march. The sun set; a breeze sprang up; and soon the three travellers saw with joy the smoke of a fire which had been lighted as a guide to them. They staggered on, and at last all three fell fainting in sight of their companions, who hurried forward to relieve them.