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the expedition returned with the information that "in this discovery were found everywhere shallow water and barren coasts; islands altogether thinly populated by divers cruel, poor, and brutal natives, and of very little use to the Company."

Nothing further is known until 1627, when the "Gulde Zeepaerd," under the command of François Thyssen, sighted the south coast just beyond Cape Leeuwin and made an exhaustive examination of the coastline for about 1,000 miles eastward, giving to the part explored the name of Nuyts Land, in honour of the chief passenger, Pieter Nuyts, who was afterwards Ambassador to Japan and subsequently Governor of Formosa. In Nuyts Land was embraced all that territory lying at the head of the Great Australian Bight.

Dirk Hartog's Plate, 1616.	Valming's Plate, 1697.

In the second half of the same year, on July 22, 1627, the Governor-General of the Dutch Indies sailed from Table Bay with the ships "Galias," "Utrecht," and "Texel." All went well up to August 10, when the rudder of the "Galias" broke, and the ship becoming unmanageable, the other vessels passed out of sight. Repairs being effected the next day she proceeded on her course alone, and on September 5 came suddenly upon the Land of Eendraght, which by the reckoning of the chart should have been nearly 350 miles farther east. The Governor’s experience on this voyage and his nearness to shipwreck led him to request the Company to give particular attention to correcting the miscalculations in the chart—a work that seems to have been very urgently required. Accuracy of observation and charting was therefore enjoined upon succeeding captains, with a result beneficial alike to navigation and geography.

Early in the following year Captain De Witt in the "Vianen," homeward bound, touched the shore on the north-west coast in the neighbourhood of Kimberley, and after making a cursory examination for some 50 miles gave it the name of De Witt Land.

The same year, 1628, was also to witness the commencement of one of the most important and exciting voyages made to the new land. On the whole the history of early Australian discovery is a calm and quiet story, without trace of adventure, recording nothing of an eventful nature beyond the sighting and superficial examination of stretches of isolated and uninteresting coast. But there are some exceptions, and perhaps the greatest of these is the tragic voyage of the "Batavia," whose passengers and crew formed the first white settlers on Australian soil, albeit involuntarily and for many of them with dire results.

The relation of this voyage, probably compiled from Pelsart's Journal, was first published in Dutch at Amsterdam in 1647, and was repeatedly republished during the succeeding few years. It was used by Thevenot in 1663 to compile a French version for his "Recueil de divers voyages curieux," and all English accounts were merely abridgments of this until 1897, when Mr. W. Siebenhaar, of Perth, undertook a complete translation of the Dutch account. It is from this, with Mr. Siebenhaar's kind permission, that our description of the voyage is taken. Pelsart's Journal was recently published by Professor Heeres, but the fact and particulars of the shipwreck were omitted as being already sufficiently known.

In 1628 General Pieter Carpentier returned safely from the East Indies with five richly-laden merchant