The Government of Tasmania very liberally caused to be

photo-lithographed a facsimile copy .which I had made of a

chart showing the tracks of Tasman in his two voyages of

of discovery in the years 1642 and 1644. The chart copied is in the Sloane Collection in the British Museum, and is

marked on the back " Bibl. Sloan. 5222, 12. N.W. Closet 16."

It is evidently a manuscript of the latter half of the 17th

century, and was certainly copied by an Englishman, and

probably from the original chart of Francz Jacobsz Visser, the

chief pilot on board the Heemskirk on Tasman's first voyage,

and captain and chief pilot of the Lemmen, Tasman's flagship

in the expedition of 1644. A reduced map from the same

chart is given in Major's "Early Voyages to Terra Australis,"

published in 1859 by the Hakluyt Society

Mault, Alfred

University of Tasmania Open Access Repository

NOTE ON AN EAELY OHAET SHOWING THETEACKS OF TASMAN'S VOYAGES IN 1642 AND1644.(Diagram.)By A. Mault,(Read April 9, 1894.,)The Government of Tasmania very liberally caused to bephoto-lithographed a facsimile copy .which I had made of achart showing the tracks of Tasman in his two voyages ofpf discovery in the years 1642 and 1644. The chart copied ism the Sloane Collection in the British Museum, and ismarked on the back " Bibl. Sloan. 5222, 12. N.W. Closet 16."It is evidently a manuscript of the latter half of the 17thcentury, and was certainly copied by an Englishman, andprobably from the original chart of Francz Jacobsz Visser, thechief pilot on board the HeemsMrJc on Tasman's first voyage,and captain and chief pilot of the Lemmen, Tasman's flagshipin the expedition of 1644. A reduced map from the samechart is given in Major's "Early Voyages to Terra Australis,"published in 1859 by theHakluyt Society.The Museum chart is drawn on paper in black ink, nowfaded. After the chart was drawn (possibly since Major's^ap was published) some one has added blue chalk lines,connecting Tasman's discoveries in the south of Tasmaniawith those he made in New Guinea on the one side, and those°f Peter Nuyts on the other. In the photolithographs thesepltte lines have come out black. " Abell Tasman's passage"is marked in pricked lines. That of the 1642 voyage beginsat about the longitude of Cape Leeuwin and ends at the northpf the island of Ceram, the last place mentioned in Tasmans'journal of that voyage. The track of the 1644 voyage beginsat the south-western coast of New Guinea, and, missingTorres Straits, goes round the Gulf of Carpentaria and thenorthern and western shores of Australia to Endracht Landwhence he returned to Batavia. In the pricked track of thefirst voyage no soundiugs are given, in that of the second thesoundings are given along the part of the passage withinsoundings. I therefore think this chart is a copy of thatmade by Francz Jacobsz during this second expedition._Andthere are other circumstances substantiating this opinion,notably the inscription in the middle of the chart, to which1 shall again refer.The expedition of 1644 probably started from Batavia onthe 30th of January in that year, and was expected to return,if the instructions were fulfilled, in July, but as no journal ofthe voyage has been yet discovered this chart and a fewD28notes made by Burgomaster Wilson, in ] 705, are the onlyparticulars that we know about it, except the " Instructions "above mentioned, which were given to Tasman by AntonioVan Diemen, the Governor, and the Council of the DutchEast Indies, and dated at Batavia the 29th January, 1644, -.jWith reference to the British Museum chart, of which I begto present to the Boyal Society the photo-lithographed fac-similes, Major says: "It bears no name or date, but iswritten on exactly the same kind of paper, with the same ink,and by the same hand as one by Captain Thomas Bowrey inthe same volume, done at Fort S. George in 1687. It isobservable that in the preface to a work by Captain Bowreyon the Malay language, he says that in 1688 he embarked atFort S, George as a passenger for England, having been,nineteen years in the East Indies continually engaged in.navigation and trading in those countries, in Sumatra, Borneo,Bantam, and Java." Major goes on to say : " The twofoldblunder, both as to fact and date, contained in the sentencein the middle of the chart— ' This large land of New Guineawas first discovered to joyne to if south, land by y e yotLemmen as by this chart Francois Jacobus, Vis. Pilot Major,Anno 1643 '—is self-evidently an independent subsequentinsertion, probably by Bowrey himself, and therefore by nomeans impugns the inference that the chart is otherwise a.genuine copy."When I saw the chart it was not bound in a volume, so Ihad no opportunity of comparing its paper, ink, and hand-writing with those of the other chart referred to by Major, soI accept his opinion as correct that probably the copy was thehandiwork of Captain Bowrey. But I cannot accept thestatements that the chart bears no name or date, and that theinscription in the middle of it " is self-evidently an indepen-dent subsequent insertion." This second statement is, ofcourse, necessary to support the first, as if the inscription isnot a subsequent insertion the chart cannot be said to bearany name or date. So far from the inscription being self-evidently an independent subsequent insertion, I think theevidence all points the other way. The error in the date isno doubt the fault of Captain Bowrey, or whoever else wasthe copyist of the chart and translator into English of theDutch inscriptions on the original, but I take it that thewording of it shows that it is a translation of the chiefpilot's inscription on the chart he prepared aud sent in as theofficial return to the orders of the " Instructions " with refer-ence to discovering " whether Nova Guinea is one continentwith that great southland." It is barely possible that Bowreycould have known of this instruction, which the originalwriter of the inscription must evidently have known to be thegreat object of the voyage of the Lemmen and her consorts.i29The expedition of 1644, under the command of Tasman ascommodore, consisted of the yacht Lemmen, with a crew of45 sailors and 11 soldiers, under the subordinate command ofskipper chief pilot Franz Jacobsz Visser; the yacht Zeemeuw,with 35 sailors and six soldiers, under the command ofSkipper Dirk Comelisz Haan ; and a smaller yacht as tender,the BraJc, with 14 sailors, under the command of SkipperJasper Jansz Koops. The yachts were plentifully provisionedfor eig;ht months. The instructions issued to Tasman, whichwere discovered at Batavia, and published a little more thana hundred years ago by Dalrymple, constitute a very remark-able document, and exemplify the prescient spirit of theleaders of Dutch East Indian enterprise, for had Tasmansucceeded in fulfilling them he would have anticipated byneai-ly 130 years Captain Cook's Australian discoveries, andby about 150 years those of Bass and Minders.The instructions begin with a recital of all the Dutch ex-peditions that had made any discoveries in connection withthe great southland prior to Tasman's voyage of 1642,concerning which voyage they say simply —"It is unnecessaryto relate more here, as you are perfectly acquainted with allparticulars." They thus record the discoveries made by theyacht the Buyfhen in 1606, on the east side of what we now«all the Gulf of Carpentaria; of D'Edel's Land in 1617, onthe west coast of Australia; of Endraght Land further northin 1618-1622; of Arnhem's Land on the west side of theGulf of Carpentaria in 1623 ; and of Peter Nuyt's Land onthe south coast in 1627. It will be noticed that the dis-coveries above-named, together with the lands discovered, orseen, by Tasman in his two expeditions, are the only landsshown on the chart, and to this fact I shall refer further on.The instructions then proceed thus:—"But to obtain athorough knowledge of these extensive countries, the dis-covery whereof has been begun (in consequence of theintention of the Company and the recommendation of ourmasters), [there] now only remains for the future [to findout] whether Nova Guinea is one continent with that greatsouthland, or separated by channels and islands lyingbetween them; and also whether that New Van Diemen'sLand is the same continent with these two great countries, orwith one of them ; or, if separated from them, what islandsmaybe dispersed between Nova Guinea and the unknownsouthland, when, after more experience and knowledge of allthe said known and unknown countries, we shall be betterenabled for further undertakings."Then follow the actual instructions as to what Tasman wasto try to do. He was to make his way by the islands in theBanda Sea, Teninber, Key and Aroum (marked T. Acaga on30the chart) to False Cape, which was then thought to be partof New Guinea, and is in 8 deg. south latitude. Thence hewas to sail along the south coast of New Guinea till hereached 9 deg. of south latitude, where there was a large cove,which might be the opening into the South Sea. Into thishe was to send the tender, the BraJe, for two or three days totry and find a passage. If one were found he was to follow ituntil he reached the furthest known discovered land of theeast coast in 17 deg. of south latitude (? 7 deg.), and thenfollow the trend of the coast eastward and southward as itmight run until he reached his own discovery of the New VanDienien's Land. Thence he was to go north-westwardsto the islands of S. Peter and S. Francis lying off Peter Nuyt'sLand, and try and find another passage between them andthe southland eastward into the South Sea again. If thisother passage were discovered he was to return by it toS. Peter and S. Francis. In any case he was to return fromthese islands by the south and west coasts until he reachedWilhelm's Eiver between EndraghtLand and De Witt's Landin 22 deg. south latitude,- "when the known southland wouldbe entirely circumnavigated and discovered to be the largestisland of the globe."We all know that the fulfilment of these instructions isquite feasible. The " large cove in 9 deg. south latitude andto the south-west of False Cape is the western part of TorresStraits, and the pricked line of Tasman's passage shows thathe passed near to the entrance of Endeavour Strait, betweenthe Prince of Wales Island and Cape York, by which CaptainCook entered Torres Straits in 1770. It is at least singular tonote that the dotted line showing the edge of shoal waterthat is drawn across the cove is not also drawn acrossEndeavour Strait. And in the south, a course easterly fromS. Peter and S. Francis would have taken Tasrnan past theGreat Australian Bight and through Bass Straits. We shallprobably never know whether Tasman did send the BraJe intothe cove or strait to report, and if he did why the passagethrough was not discovered. All that we know is that he didnot pass the strait, but instead of doing so fulfilled thealternative course pointed out in the instructions. Beforefinishing with this part of my subject, I cannot forbear fromagain calling attention to the prescience of the Dutchauthorities in having in the manner mentioned thus indicatedthe real position of the straits that give passage to the northand south of Australia from the Indian Ocean to the greatSouth Sea, as they certainly knew nothing of what Torreshad done. Fifty years after Dampier still held to the opinionthat there was a great intermediate passage something likethat shown on medieval charts as running between Little Java31arid G-reatJava; and a hundred and fifty years after Flindersdid not think a strait or, at least, a great river from a centralsea quite improbable.The alternative instruction to be followed in the case thatno passage to the eastward was found at the great cove in9 deg. south latitude is thus given :—" But if (as we presume)the land of Nova Guinea is joined to the southland, and inconsequence is one continent, you will be enabled by the S.E.trade wind to run along the north coast from 7 deg. to22_deg. south, and thus entirely to discover this land." It isevident from this that Van Diemen and his Council at Bataviathought that Arnhem's Land was an island, and that thewesterapart of the northern shore of Australia trended westward fromthe southern end of the Gulf of Carpentaria to about North-West Cape in De Witt's Land and north of Endraght Land.On arriving at Endraght Land, Tasman was—time andweather permitting—to go on southwards to Houtman'sAbrolhos and try to recover the treasure lost there in 1629by the wreck of the Batavia. He was also to inquire aftertwo of the mutineers of the crew of that ship, who had beenmarooned instead of being executed with their companions.It seems from the chart that Tasman did not go south ofEndraght Land to fulfil these latter instructions. Probablythe time he had taken to get round the gulf and then follow thecoast of Arnhem's Land and De Witt's Land to his turningpoint at about 23 deg. south had pretty well exhausted hisprovisions and water. I cannot help thinking that thequestion of victualling his ships had something to do withthe non-fulfilment of the instruction as to finding a passagethrough Torres Straits. The voyage that the fulfilment ofthat instruction would have entailed would have been one ofat least 13,000 miles, and mostly in unknown waters, andWithout much sea room if coast charts were to be made.Judging from his previous voyage, this would have taken atleast 13 months, and he had only eight months' provisions.To revert_ to the chart, the sailing instructions given fullybear out with regard to what Tasman was to do what Icalled your attention to in connection with what had beenpreviously done, namely, that the chart refers to only-tasman' s expedition—that all the information given upon thechart is_given in connection with or in consequence of theinstructions. As this is so, I do not see how we can resistthe conclusion that the Dutch original from which it wastaken and translated was the work of Eranz Jacobsz,lasman's chief pilot on both of his expeditions, and that theinscription in the middle of the chart is a translation ofJacobsz's own writing. The material information upon whichthe chart is constructed was all in Jacobsz's possession, andm no other person's except Tasman's, That information was32derived from three sources : First, from the records of theprevious voyages referred to in the instructions ; secondly,from the record of Tasman's expedition of 1642 ; and thirdly,from the records of the expedition of 1644. With regard tothe first of these sources, the recital of the previous dis-coveries in Nova Guinea and the southland, and the,instructions as to what -was to be done in regard to connectingthem could not have been understood, unless charts werefurnished showing the relative positions, and from thesecharts the eastern side of the Gulf of Carpentaria, the north-eastern part of Arnhem's Land and De Witt's Land,Endraght Land, D'Bdel's Land, Leeuwin Land, and PeterNuyt's Land would be laid down. With regard to thesecond source of information, an examination of the chartwill show that the original of it was made by some one whohad access to not only to Tasman's chart but also to his-journal of the voyage of 1642-3, as the notes made on thenorth coast of Guinea are similar to those contained in thejournal. When all the information to be obtained fromthese two sources was laid down upon the chart it would beas complete as it now is with the exception of the new landdiscovered in the course of the voyage of 1644. And thecoast line of this new land, and the pricked line of thepassage made while discovering it, is all that Jacobsz refersto in his central inscription.Another argument in favour of the inscription being acopy of Jacobsz's attestation of the chart, and not anindependent subsequent insertion of Bowrey, is that the nameof New Guinea is applied to the new discovered land. Veryshortly after the expedition of 1644 the newly-discovered landwas called New Holland, and if Bowrey had written anindependent title to his copy he would probably have thusnamed it. Dampier, who was on this coast in 1688, and againin 1699, always calls it New Holland.It is evident that the Dutch authorities made no secret ofTasman's discoveries on this Toyage, but that charts of itwere published, or at least allowed to be copied. It isprobable that Bowrey was thus allowed to make the copy inthe Sloane collection. Dampier had a copy with him during,his expedition of 1699, when he was in command of one ofthe king's ships. It evidently was similar to the one before,us, for he complains of Tasman's (Mr. Tasman he politely callshim) inaccuracies in latitude. He gives two latitudes fromthe charts he refers to, one being that of the Abrulhos, which.he mentions as erroneously laid down at 27 deg. 28 min.south, and the other being the Archipelago, now called afterDampier, which he says Mr. Tasman lays down in 19 deg.50 min. instead of 20 deg. 21 min. south. The chart beforeus gives the latitudes Dampier says are wrong, so he evidentlyhad a copy of the same original. With respect to theselatitudes, I may mention that in the case of the AbrulhosDampier is wrong, but in that of the Archipelago he isright.I have referred to the prescience of the Dutch authoritiesm geographical matters as shown by the "Instructions."The instructions also illustrate their—shall I politely call ittheir keenness ? in trading matters. Tasman is told when"shewing the samples and goods, you and the juniormerchants are carefully to remark what goods the strangenation most esteem, and to which they are most inclined;likewise inquire what merchandise and goods they posses?,particularly after gold and silver, and whether these metalsare held in great esteem ; to keep them ignorant of theprecious value seem not greedy after it ; if they offer tobarter for your goods, seem not to covet these metals, butshew them copper, zinc, pewter, and lead as if these were ofmore value to us. If you find them inclined to trade, keepthe goods which they seem most greedy after at so high avalue that none may be sold or bartered without great profit."And so on.To return to the instructions : If Tasman had fulfilledthem and sailed round Australia and also round Tasmania,what would have been the result ? Would Australian historyhave taken another course ? I do not think so. The Dutchare a trading people rather than a colonising one. Theseexpeditions of Tasman were solely for the purpose of open-ing new markets, and as they did not have that effect, onaccount of the low condition of the people, both in regard tonumbers and attainments in the countries of the Australiancontinent and islands, they had no other effect. In due timethe English entered into possession, and it is interesting tonote how in the early days of their colonisation the claims ofthe Dutch were evidently admitted to the west or NewHolland side of the continent, by limitations in the com-missions of the Governors of New South Wales.

Note on an early chart showing the tracks of Tasman's voyages in 1642 and 1644

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