with the party
last mentioned, which was the weakest, killing the whole of them,
excepting seven children and some women. They hoped to succeed as
easily with Weybehays' company, and in the meanwhile broke open
the chests of merchandise which had been saved from the vessel.
Jerome Cornelis caused clothing to be made [Sidenote: 1629]
for his company out of the rich stuffs which he found therein,
choosing to himself a bodyguard, each of whom he clothed in scarlet,
embroidered with gold and silver. Regarding the women as part of
the spoil, he took one for himself, and gave one of the daughters
of the minister to a principal member of his party, abandoning
the other three for public use. He drew up also certain rules for
the future conduct of his men.
[Illustration: A DUTCH MAN-OF-WAR OF THE END OF THE 17th CENTURY. From a
print after Vandervelde.]
"After these horrible proceedings he caused himself to be elected
captain-general by a document which he compelled all his
companions to sign. He afterwards sent twenty-two men in two
shallops to destroy the company of Weybehays, but they met with a
repulse. Taking with him thirty-seven men, he went himself against
Weybehays, who received him at the water's edge as he disembarked,
and forced him to retire, although the lieutenant and his men had
no weapons but clubs, the ends of which were armed with spikes.
Finding force unavailing, the mutineer had recourse to other
means. He proposed a treaty of peace, the chaplain, who remained
with Weybehays, drawing up the conditions. It was agreed to with
this proviso, that Weybehays' company should remain unmolested,
and they, upon their part, agreed to deliver up a little boat in
which one of the sailors had escaped from the island where
Cornelis was located to that of Weybehays, receiving in return
some stuffs for clothing his people. During his negotiations
Cornelis wrote to certain French soldiers who belonged to the
lieutenant's company offering to each a sum of money to corrupt
them, with the hope that with this assistance he might easily
compass his design. His letters, which were without effect, were
shown to Weybehays, and Cornelis, who was ignorant of their
disclosure, having arrived the next day with three or four others
to find Weybehays and bring him the apparel, the latter caused him
to be attacked, killed two or three of the company, and took
Cornelis himself prisoner. One of them, by name Wouterlos, who
escaped from this rout, returned the following day to renew the
attack, but with little success.
"Pelsart arrived during these occurrences in the frigate _Sardam_.
As he approached the wreck he observed smoke from a distance, a
circumstance that afforded him great consolation, since he
perceived by it that his people were not all dead. He cast anchor,
and threw himself immediately into a skiff with bread and wine,
and proceeded to land on one of the islands. Nearly at the same
time a boat came alongside with four armed men. Weybehays, who was
one of the four, ... informed him of the massacre, and advised him
to return as speedily as possible to his vessel, for that the
conspirators designed to surprise him, having already murdered
twenty-five persons, and to attack him with two shallops, adding
that he himself had that morning been at close quarters with them.
Pelsart perceived at the same time the two shallops coming towards
him, and had scarcely got on board his own vessel before they came
alongside. He was surprised to see the people covered with
embroidery of gold and silver and weapons in their hands, and
demanded of them why they approached the vessel armed. They
replied that they would inform him when they came on board. He
commanded them to cast their arms into the sea, or otherwise he
would sink them. Finding themselves compelled [Sidenote: 1629]
to submit, they threw away their weapons, and being ordered on
board, were immediately placed in irons. One of them, named Jan
de Bremen, confessed that he had put to death or assisted in the
assassination of twenty-seven persons. The same evening Weybehays
brought his prisoner on board.
"On the 18th day of September the captain and the master-pilot,
taking with them ten men of Weybehays' company, passed over in
boats to the island of Cornelis. Those who still remained thereon
lost all courage as soon as they saw them, and allowed themselves
to be placed in irons."
Pelsart remained another week at the Abrolhos, endeavouring to recover
some of the _Batavia's_ treasure, and succeeded in finding all but one
chest. The mutineers were tried by the officers of the _Sardam_, and all
but two were executed before the ship left the scene of their awful crime.
The two men who were not hanged were put on shore on the mainland, and
were probably the first Europeans to end their lives upon the continent.
Dutch vessels for many years afterwards sought for traces of the marooned
seamen, but none were ever discovered.
The 1644 voyage of Tasman was made expressly for the purpose of exploring
the north and north-western shores of the continent, and to prove the
existence or otherwise of straits separating it from New Guinea. Tasman's
instructions show this, and prove that while the existence of the straits
was suspected, and although Torres had unconsciously passed through them,
they were not known. Tasman explored a long length of coast-line,
establishing its continuity from the extreme north-western point (Arnhem
Land) as far as the twenty-second degree of south latitude (Exmouth Gulf).
He failed to prove the existence of Torres Straits, but to him, it is
generally agreed, is due the discovery and naming of the Gulf of
Carpentaria (Carpenter in Tasman's time being President at Amsterdam of
the Dutch East India Company) and the naming of a part of North Australia,
as he had previously named the island to the south, after Van Diemen. From
this voyage dates the name New Holland: the great stretch of coast-line
embracing his discoveries became known to his countrymen as Hollandia
Nova, a name which in its English form was adopted for the whole
continent, and remained until it was succeeded by the more euphonious name
of Australia. Tasman continued doing good service for the Dutch East India
Company until his death at Batavia about 1659.
The last Dutch voyage which space permits us to mention [Sidenote: 1727]
briefly is that of the _Zeewigk_, which ship was wrecked on the Abrolhos
in 1727, with a quantity of treasure on board. Some of the crew built a
sloop out of the wreck and made their way to Batavia, taking with them
the bulk of the treasure; but from time to time, even down to the present
century, relics of the wreck, including several coins, have been
recovered, and are now to be seen in the museum of the West Australian
capital. But before the Dutch had given up exploring the coast of New
Holland, Dampier, the first Englishman to set foot upon its shores, had
twice visited the continent, and with his two voyages the English naval
story of Australia may properly begin.
CHAPTER II.
DAMPIER: THE FIRST ENGLISHMAN IN AUSTRALIA.
"I dined with Mr. Pepys, where was Captain Dampier, who had been a
famous buccaneer, had brought hither the painted Prince Job, and
printed a relation of his very strange adventure and his
observations. He was now going abroad again by the King's
encouragement, who furnished a ship of 290 tons. He seemed a more
modest man than one would imagine by the relation of the crew he
had consorted with. He brought a map of his observations of the
course of the winds of the South Sea, and assured us that the maps
hitherto extant were all false as to the Pacific Sea, which he
makes on the south of the line, that on the north and running by
the coast of Peru being I exceedingly tempestuous."
Thus wrote John Evelyn on August 6th, 1698.
Of the adventurous career of Dampier prior to this date too much fiction
and quite enough history has already been written; but we cannot omit a
short account of the buccaneer's life up to the time of his receiving King
William's commission.
Dampier was born in 1652 at East Coker, [Sidenote: 1673-1698]
Somersetshire. Of his parents he tells us that "they did not originally
design me for the sea, but bred me at school till I came of years fit for
a trade. But upon the death of my mother they who had the disposal of me
took other measures, and, having removed me from the Latin school to learn
writing and arithmetic, they soon placed me with a master of a ship at
Weymouth, complying with the inclinations I had very early of seeing the
world."
Dampier made several voyages in merchantmen; then he shipped as able
seaman on the _Royal Prince_, Captain Sir Edward Spragge, and served under
him till the death of that commander at the end of the Dutch war in 1673.
Soon after he made a voyage to the West Indies; then began an adventurous
life--ashore cutting logwood in the Bay of Campeachy when not fighting;
afloat a buccaneer--of which he has given us details in his _Voyage round
the Terrestrial Globe_.
In March, 1686, Dampier in a little barque, the _Cygnet_, commanded by
Captain Swan, quitted the American coast and sailed westward across the
Pacific. On this voyage the _Cygnet_ touched at the Ladrones, the Bashee
Islands, the Philippines, Celebes, Timor, New Holland, and the Nicobar
Islands. Here Dampier left his ship and worked his way to England, which
he reached in 1691. (The _Cygnet_ was afterwards lost off Madagascar.) He
had brought home with him from Mindanao a tattooed slave, whom he called
the "Painted Prince Jeoey," and who was afterwards exhibited as the first
painted savage ever seen in England. "Jeoey," who died at Oxford, is the
"painted Prince Job" mentioned by Evelyn.
It has been stated that the _Cygnet_ touched at New Holland. This land was
sighted on January 4th, 1688, in what Dampier says was "latitude 16·50 S.
About three leagues to the eastward of this point there is a pretty deep
bay, with abundance of islands in it, and a very; good place to anchor in
or to haul ashore. About a league to the eastward of that point we
anchored January the 5th, 1688, two miles from the shore."
A modern map of West Australia will show the West Kimberley goldfield. To
the west of the field is the district of West Kimberley, and upon the
coast-line is the Buccaneer Archipelago. The bay in which Dampier anchored
is still called Cygnet Bay, and it is situated in the north-west corner
of King's Sound, of which "that point" to which "we went a league to the
eastward" is named Swan Point, while a rock called Dampier's Monument more
particularly commemorates the buccaneer's visit.
The ship remained in Cygnet Bay until March 12th, and during that time the
vessel was hove down and repaired. Dampier's observations on the
aboriginal inhabitants during his stay is summed up in his description of
the natives whom he saw, and who were, he says, "the most miserable people
in the world. The Hodmadods" (Hottentots) "of Monomatapa, though a nasty
people, yet for wealth are gentlemen to these." He gives an accurate
description of the country so far as he saw it, and asserts that "New
Holland is a very large tract of land. It is not yet determined whether it
is an island or a main continent; but I am certain that it joins neither
Asia, Africa, nor America."
While the ship was being overhauled under the sweltering rays of a
tropical sun, the men lived on shore in a tent, and Dampier, who was tired
of the voyage, probably because there were no Spaniards to fight and no
prizes to be made, endeavoured to persuade his companions to shape their
next course for some port where was an English factory; but they would
not listen to him, and for his pains he was threatened that when the ship
was ready for sea he should be landed and left behind.
Evelyn tells us that in 1698 Dampier was going abroad again by the King's
commission, and this second voyage of the ex-buccaneer to the South Seas,
although of small importance to geographers, is noteworthy, inasmuch as
Dampier's was the first visit of a ship of the English royal navy to
Australian seas.
To understand what sort of an expedition was this of two hundred years
ago, how Dampier was equipped and what manner of ship and company he
commanded, it will not be out of place to give some account of the navy at
that time. When James II. abdicated in 1688, according to Pepys, the royal
navy was made up of 173 ships of 101,892 tons, an armament of 6930 guns,
and 42,003 men. William died in 1702, and the number of ships had then
increased to 272, and the tonnage to 159,020 tons.
The permanent navy, begun by Henry VIII. and given its first system of
regular warfare by the Duke of York in 1665, had become well established,
and trading vessels had ceased to form a part of the regular
establishment. King William III., although not so good a friend to the
service as his predecessor, and anything but a sailor, like the fourth
William, did not altogether neglect it. In the Introduction to James'
_Naval History_ we are told that between the years 1689 and 1697 the navy
lost by capture alone 50 vessels, and it is probable that an equal number
fell by the perils of the sea. King William meantime added 30 ships, and
half that number were captured from the French, while several 20 and
30-gun ships were besides taken from the enemy.
Coming back to the first naval expedition to Australia, the ship commanded
by Dampier was the _Roebuck_, as Evelyn tells us, a vessel of 290 tons.
Dampier has left very little description of his ship, but it is not
difficult to picture her, for by this time the ratings of ships had been
settled upon certain lines, and the meaning of the word "rating" as used
at this period is easily ascertainable.
According to Charnock's _Marine Architecture_, the _Roebuck_, lying at
Deptford in June, 1684, was a sixth-rate of 24 guns and 85 men. This was
her war complement; but Dampier himself tells us that he "sailed from the
Downs early on Saturday, January 14th, 1699, with a fair wind, in His
Majesty's ship the _Roebuck_, carrying but 12 guns on this voyage and 50
men with 20 months' provisions."
In 1677, according to James' _History_, the smallest fifth-rate then
afloat corresponds nearest to the _Roebuck_, and, no doubt, by Dampier's
time this vessel had been reduced in her rating. The vessel of 1677 is
described as being of 265 tons and 28 guns, "sakers and minions," with a
complement of about 100 men. The largest sixth-rate was 199 tons, 18 guns,
and 85 men. So from these particulars we can take it as correct that the
_Roebuck_ in 1699 was a sixth-rate. It is worth remembering that in
Cavendish's second expedition to the South Sea, in 1591, there was a ship
called the _Roebuck_, commanded by John Davis, and likely enough the
sixth-rate in which Dampier sailed was named after her, those who gave her
the name little thinking at the time of her christening (she was built
before Dampier's voyage, and was certainly not the _Roebuck_ of
Cavendish's fleet) how appropriately they were naming her for her future
service.
[Illustration: THE SOVEREIGN OF THE SEAS, BUILT IN THE YEAR 1637. From a
print in the British Museum by Paine.]
Her armament is a matter of interest, for just about her time--that is,
between the years 1685 and 1716--the naming of guns after beasts and
birds of prey went out of fashion, and they were distinguished by the
weight of the shot fired. James, quoting from Sir William Monson's _Naval
Tracts_, supplies the following table on the subject of sea guns; and, as
they were probably still in use in Dampier's time, we print it here:--
| Bore of | Weight of | Weight of | Weight of
Names. |cannon in | cannon in | shot in | powder in
| inches. | pounds. | pounds. | pounds.
| | | |
Cannon-royal | 8-1/2 | 8000 | 66 | 30
Cannon | 8 | 6000 | 60 | 27
Cannon-serpentine | 7 | 5500 | 53-1/2 | 25
Bastard cannon | 7 | 4500 | 41 | 20
Demi-cannon | 6-3/4 | 4000 | 33-1/2 | 18
Cannon-petro | 6 | 4000 | 24-1/2 | 14
Culverin | 5-1/2 | 4500 | 17-1/2 | 12
Basilisk | 5 | 4000 | 15 | 10
Demi-culverin | 4 | 3400 | 9-1/2 | 8
Bastard culverin | 4 | 3000 | 5 | 5-3/4
Sakers | 3-1/2 | 1400 | 5-1/2 | 5-1/2
Minion | 3-1/2 | 1000 | 4 | 4
Falcon | 2-1/2 | 660 | 2 | 3-1/2
Falconet | 2 | 500 | 1-1/2 | 3
Serpentine | 1-1/2 | 400 | 3/4 | 1-3/4
Rabinet | 1 | 300 | 1/2 | 1/2
The small arms were matchlocks, snaphainces, musketoons, blunderbusses,
pistols, halberts, swords, and hangers.
From this it will be seen that the _Roebuck's_ guns, considering the
peaceful service she was upon, were probably known to her company as
"sakers" and "falcons."
In a sixth-rate the sakers were carried all on the one deck, and the
minions on the quarterdeck. Charnock supplies an illustration of a
sixth-rate of the time, and the picture is a familiar one to all who have
taken even a slight interest in the ships of a couple of centuries ago. A
lion rampant decorates the stem, set as it remained till early in the
present century (the galley prow had gone with Charles I.); the hull
looked not a whit more clumsy than that of an old north-country collier of
our youth, but the flat stern, with its rows of square windows, richly
carved panelling, and big stern-lanterns, and the row of round gun-ports
encircled by gold wreaths along the ship's sides, are distinctive marks of
this period.
A vessel of this kind was ship-rigged, about 88 feet long by 24 feet beam;
the depth of her hold, in which to store her twenty months' provisions (a
marvellously large quantity as stores were then carried), was about 11
feet, and her draught of water when loaded about 12 feet aft. She had one
deck and a poop and forecastle, the former extending from either end of
the ship to the waist. A good deal of superfluous ornament had by this
time been done away with, although there was plenty of it so late as 1689.
Charnock describes a man-of-war of that date. After the Restoration, ships
grew apace in grandeur in and out. Inboard they were painted a dull red
(this was, it is said, so that in fighting the blood of the wounded should
not show), outside blue and gilded in the upper parts, then yellow, and
last black to the water-line, with white bottoms. Copper sheathing had not
come into use, and ships' bottoms were treated with tallow, which was made
to adhere by being laid on between nails which studded the bottom.
The pitching of the vessels imperilled the masts of these somewhat cranky
ships of 1689, says a writer of about Dampier's time, who also tells us
that ships then had awnings, and that "glass lanthorns were worthier best
made of crystal horn; lanthorns were worthier than isinglass."
The sails were the usual courses: big topsails and topgallantsails,
staysails, and topmastsails, with a spritsail and a lateen-mizen; the
spanker and jib were not yet, but the sprit-topsail had just gone out. The
ship when rigged and fitted ready for sea probably cost King William's
Admiralty about £10,000. But the _Roebuck_ was pretty well worn out when
