The spirits of our sailors were greatly exhilarated when we reached Dusky Bay, New Zealand. Landing a shooting party at Duck Cove, we found a native with his club and some women behind him, who would not move. His fears, however, were all dissipated by Captain Cook going up to embrace him. After a stay here we opened Queen Charlotte's Sound and found the Adventure at anchor; none can describe the joy we felt at this most happy meeting. They had experienced terrible weather, and having made no discovery of land, determined to bear away from Van Diemen's Land, which was supposed to join New Holland and was discovered by Tasman, in 1642 A.D. Here they refitted their ship, and after three months' separation met us again.
During all this arduous experience of seamanship, sometimes involved in sheets of snow, and in mists so dark that a man on the forecastle could not be seen from the quarter-deck, it was astonishing that the crew of the Resolution should continue in perfect health. Nothing can redound more to the honour of Captain Cook than his paying particular attention to the preservation of health among his company. By observing the strictest discipline from the highest to the lowest, his commands were duly observed and punctually executed.
After a lengthened stay with the New Zealanders, and all hopes of discovering a continent having now vanished, we were induced to believe that there is no southern continent between New Zealand and America, and, steering clear the island, we made our way to Otaheite, where the Resolution lost her lower anchor in the bay. Excursions were made inland, and King Otoo, a personable man, six feet in height, and about thirty years of age, treated the party with great entertainment.
On January 30, 1774, we sailed from New Zealand, and reaching latitude 67° 5' S., we found an immense field of ice with ninety-seven ice-hills glistening white in the distance. Captain Cook says: "I will not say it was impossible anywhere to get further to the south, but the attempting it would have been a dangerous and rash enterprise, and what I believe no man in any situation would have thought of."
We therefore sailed northward again, meeting with heavy storms, and the captain, being taken ill with a colic, and in the extremity of the case, the doctor fed him with the flesh of a favourite dog.
On the discovery of Palmerston Island—named after one of the Lords of the Admiralty—and Savage Island, as appropriate to the character of the natives, we had some adventures with the Mallicos, who express their admiration by hissing like a goose.
We stayed some time in Tanna, with its volcano furiously burning, and then steering south-west, we discovered an uninhabited island, which Captain Cook named Norfolk Island, in honour of the noble family of Howard. We reached the Straits of Magalhaes, and, going north, the captain gave the names of Cumberland Bay and the Isle of Georgia, and then we found a land ice-bound and inhospitable. At last we reached home, landing at Portsmouth on July 30, 1775.
III.—The Pacific Isles and the Arctic Circle
Former navigators had returned to Europe by the Cape of Good Hope; the arduous task was now assigned to Captain Cook of attempting it by reaching the high northern latitudes between Asia and America. He was then ordered to proceed to Otaheite, or the Society Islands, and then, having crossed the Equator into the northern tropics, to hold such a course as might best probably give success to the attempt of finding out a northern passage.
On the afternoon of July 11, 1776, Captain Cook set sail from Plymouth in the Resolution, giving orders to Captain Clerke to follow in the Discovery. After a short stay at Santa Cruz, in the island of Teneriffe, we were joined by the Discovery at Cape Town.