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
Dampier was given the command of her, as he tells us when relating her
subsequent loss.
_The British Fleet_, by Commander C.N. Robinson, is an invaluable book to
the student of naval history, and, notwithstanding plenty of book
authorities and ten years' study of the subject, the present writers are
compelled to draw upon Commander Robinson for many details. With the aid
of this work and from allusions to be found in the writings of a couple of
centuries ago, it is possible to make some sort of picture of Dampier's
companions in the _Roebuck_.
Dampier himself was a type of naval officer who entered the service of the
country by what was then, and remained for many years afterwards, one of
the best sources of supply. He had been given a fair education, and had
been duly apprenticed and learned the profession of a sailor in a merchant
ship. Upon his return from his first voyage to the South Seas he published
an account of his travels, and dedicated it to the President of the Royal
Society, the Hon. Charles Mountague, who, appreciating the author's zeal
and his intelligent public spirit, recommended him to the patronage of
the Earl of Oxford, then Principal Lord of the Admiralty. Dampier's
dedication has nothing of the fulsome flattery and begging-letter style so
often the chief characteristic of such compositions, but is the
straightforward offer of a humble worker in science of the best of his
work to the man best able to appreciate and to make the most of it.
Dampier's dedication led to his appointment in the navy, and the
transaction does honour to both the patron and him who was patronized.
As is well known, until comparatively recent times only the officers of
the fighting branch held commissions; all others were either warrant or
petty officers. In the time of William III., a captain and one lieutenant
were allowed to each ship, and none of the other officers held
commissions. The peaceful mission of the _Roebuck_ justifies us in
concluding that Dampier held the King's commission as a lieutenant
commanding, and he was probably given a lieutenant to take charge in case
of accident, a master, a couple of master's mates, a gunner, a boatswain
and carpenter, and the usual petty officers; seamen and boys made up the
complement. Dampier's pay, so far as we can ascertain, would be at the
rate of about £12 per month.
Two regiments of marine infantry had been formed so early as 1689, but
they were disbanded nine years later. It was not until 1703 that the
marines, all infantry, became a permanent branch of the service.
Uniforms had not even been thought of at this time, and the _Roebuck's_
officers, from her commander downwards, ate and drank and clothed
themselves in much the same fashion as their men. Dampier probably had a
room right aft under the long poop, and the other officers at the same end
of the ship in canvas-partitioned cabins, the fore part of her one living
deck being occupied by the crew. There was probably a mess-room under the
poop common to all the officers. What they had to eat and drink, as we
have said, was the same for all ranks. Here is a scale of provisions for
eighty-five men of a sixth-rate of 1688 for two months, taken from
Charnock:--
Tons cwts. qrs. lbs.
Beer (each man a wine gallon per day) . . 17 0 0 0
Bread ( " 1 lb. per day) . . 2 2 1 0
Beef ( " 4 " week) . . 1 4 0 0
Pork ( " 2 " " ) . . 0 12 0 16
Pease ( " 2 pints per week) . . 0 12 0 16
Oatmeal ( " 3 " " )[A] . . 0 13 2 18
Butter ( " 6 oz. per week) . . 0 2 1 3
Cheese ( " 12 " " ) . . 0 4 2 6
Water (in iron-bound casks) . . 7 0 0 0
[Footnote A: In lieu of three eighths of a fish.]
In 1690 flour and raisins were added, and an effort made to condense
water. Beer took the place of all forms of drink, and water was at that
time carried in casks.
The dress, from contemporary prints, can be easily made out, and the
allusions of Pepys and Evelyn supply the names and materials of the
garments. Pepys' diary and letters inform us how the pursers of the time
supplied the men with slops, and in _The British Fleet_ considerable
detail on this subject is given. Roughly it may be assumed that Dampier's
sailors wore petticoats and breeches, grey kersey jackets, woollen
stockings and low-heeled shoes, and worsted, canvas, or leather caps.
Canvas, leather, and coarse cloth were the principal materials, and tin
buttons and coloured thread the most ornamental part, of the costume.
Charnock says that in 1663 "sailors began first to wear distinctive dress.
A rule was that only red caps, yarn and Irish stockings, blue shirts,
white shirts, cotton waistcoats, cotton drawers, neat leather flat-heeled
shoes, blue neckcloths, canvas suits, and rugs were to be sold to them.
Red breeches were worn."
Smollett's pictures of the service in _Roderick Random_, written forty
years after Dampier's time, give us some idea of life on board ship, for
in the forty years between the two dates it differed in no essential
particulars. Pepys describes a sailor who had lost his eye in action
having the socket plugged with oakum, a fact which tells more than could a
volume of how seamen were then cared for. It was the days of the press and
of the advance-note system, which prevailed well into the present century,
and those seamen who went with Dampier of their own free will on a voyage
where nothing but the poorest pay and no prize money was to be got were
probably the lowest and most ill-disciplined rascals, drawn from a class
upon whose characters, save for their bulldog courage and reckless
prodigality, the least written the better.
[Illustration: A SIXTH-RATE, 1684. From Charnock's "History of Marine
Architecture" [London, 1800]. _To face p_. 32.]
The modern bluejacket, superior in every respect, notwithstanding certain
croakers, is infinitely better than his ancestors in the very quality
which was their best; the modern sailor faces death soberly and decently
in forms far more terrible than were ever dreamt of by his forefathers.
When the _Calliope_ steamed out of Apia Harbour in the hurricane of March,
1889, the youngest grimy coal-trimmer, whose sole duty it was to silently
shovel coal, even though his last moment came to him while doing it,
never once asked if the ship was making way. All hands in this department
were on duty for sixteen hours, and during that time no sound was heard,
save the ring of the shovels firing the boilers, nor was a question asked
by any man as to the progress of the ship or the chances of life and
death.
Compare this end-of-the-century story with that of the loss of the
_Wager_, one of the ships of Anson's squadron; and compare the behaviour
of the _Wager's_ castaways with that of the bluejackets who stood to
attention on the deck of the _Victoria_ till the word was given to jump as
the ship heeled over--recent instances quoted merely because they occur to
the writers' minds, for there are any number of others. Such cases
illustrate forcibly this truth: we have, by careful training of the modern
sailor, added to the traditional bravery of the class a quality, not
lacking, but never properly developed, in the old type, that is, the
dignity of coolness and self-restraint, the perfect control of men in the
supreme moments of excitement and death.
Dampier's men, from a very early stage in his voyage, were a trouble to
him. Two only of them, he says, had ever crossed the line, and he was in
continual fear of some sickness arising because they were too lazy to
shift themselves, but would lie in their hammocks in wet clothes. Three
months after the ship got to sea, when nearing Brazil, he tells us that
"the disorders in my ship made me think at present that Pernambuco
would not be so fit a place for me, being told that ships ride
there two or three leagues from the town, under the command of no
forts; so that whenever I should have been ashore it might have
been easy for my discontented crew to have cut or slipt their
cables, and have gone away from me, many of them discovering
already an intention to return to England, and some of them
declaring openly that they would go no further onwards than
Brazil. I altered my course, therefore, and stood away from Bahio
de todos los Santos, or the Bay of All Saints, where I hoped to
have the governor's help, if need should require, for securing my
ship from any such mutinous attempt, being forced to keep myself
all the way upon my guard and to lie with my officers, such as I
could trust, and with small arms, upon the quarterdeck, it scarce
being safe for me to lie in my cabin, by reason of the discontents
among my men."
Similar instances of the ill-discipline of the ship are given at intervals
throughout Dampier's account of his voyage, and the commander and his
officers were all on bad terms with each other, which, however, so far as
can be judged now, was, in some degree, the fault of Dampier's uncertain
temper.
The scientific results of the _Roebuck's_ voyage were, chiefly on these
accounts, of no great importance, judged by the standard of such work
to-day; but, with the state of nautical science at the time, not much was
to be expected in the way of accurate surveying.
When Dampier set out to explore the coast of New Holland, what charts,
what instruments, what scientific knowledge and equipment, had he for the
work?
Dampier's time was distinctively an intermediate period. Little more than
a century had elapsed since Gerard Mercator's chart was published, and
Edward Wright had taught its true principles, and about half a century
before the voyage of the _Roebuck_ such improvements as Gunter's
application of logarithms to nautical calculations, middle latitude
sailing, and the measurement of a degree on the meridian were introduced.
Hadley's quadrant came thirty years after Dampier, who must have used
Davis' instrument, then about ninety years old. Davis' work on navigation,
with Wright's chart showing the northern extremity of Australia, and
Addison's _Arithmetical Navigation_ (1625) were, no doubt, text-books on
board the _Roebuck_. Longitude by chronometer was to come half a century
after Dampier was in his grave, and such charts as he possessed did little
more than indicate the existence of Terra Australis. The Portuguese,
Spanish, and Dutch maps were not easy for Englishmen to procure, and all
that Dampier has to say on the matter is:--
"But in the draught that I had of this coast, which was Tasman's,
it was laid down in 19 degrees, and the shore is laid down as
joining in one body or continent, with some openings appearing
like rivers, and not like islands, as really they are.... This
place, therefore, lies more northerly by 40 minutes than is laid
down in Mr. Tasman's draught, and besides its being made a firm,
continued land, only with some openings like the mouths of rivers,
I found the soundings also different from what the line of his
course shows them, and generally shallower than he makes them,
which inclines me to think that he came not so near the shore as
his line shows, and so had deeper soundings, and could not so well
distinguish the islands. His meridian or difference of longitude
from Sharks' Bay agrees well enough with my account, which is 232
leagues, though we differ in latitude. And, to confirm my
conjecture that the line of his course is made too near the shore,
at least not so far to the east of this place, the water is there
so shallow that he could not come there so nigh."
That the narrative of Tasman's voyage was at [Sidenote: 1638-1697]
that time in existence there is little doubt, and an outline of the coasts
visited by him was given in an atlas presented to Charles II. of England,
in 1660, by Klencke, of Amsterdam, and now in the British Museum. Major
also found in the British Museum copies of charts and a quantity of MS.
describing Tasman's 1644 voyage, which, there is reason to believe, were
made from Tasman's originals by one Captain Bowrey in 1688, who had spent
fourteen years before that date trading in the Dutch East Indies. These
documents are all that have been found, and a diligent search of
geographers still leaves undiscovered Tasman's original narrative. The
1688 copies were probably known to Dampier when he sailed in the
_Roebuck_, and he was, likely enough, supplied with specially made
duplicates by the naval authorities. In 1697 a translation of a French
book was published in England by John Dunton, of the Poultry, London, with
the title _A New Discovery of Terra Incognita Australis, or the Southern
World, by James Sadeur, a Frenchman._ The Frenchman told a story of
thirty-five years' adventures in New Holland; but his tale was a lie from
beginning to end. Coming so close to the date of Dampier's voyage, it is
worth noting that he does not allude to the book, and so probably,
notwithstanding the little knowledge Englishmen then had of the southern
continent, Dampier was shrewd enough to detect the imposture.
The _Roebuck_ struck soundings on the night of August 1st, 1699, upon the
northern part of the Abrolhos. Dampier then cautiously ran northward,
keeping the land in sight until he anchored in Dirk Hartog's Road, in a
sound which he named Sharks' Bay, for the reason that his men caught and
ate, among other things, many sharks, including one eleven feet long, and
says Dampier, "Our men eat them very savorilly." He gives us, too, a
description of the kangaroo, the first introduction of that animal to
civilization. Says the navigator, "The land animals that we saw here were
only a sort of racoons, different from those of the West Indies, chiefly
as to their legs; for these have very short fore legs, but go jumping upon
them as the others do, and, like them, are very good meat."
Sharks' Bay is in what is now called the Gascoyne division of West
Australia, after the river of that name. Its chief town is Carnarvon,
situated at the mouth of the river. Wool-growing [Sidenote: 1699]
is the principal industry, and the population is about 800.
[Illustration: CAPTAIN WILLIAM DAMPIER, R.N. From the picture in the
National Portrait Gallery painted by Thomas Murray.] _To face p_. 38.
Dampier stayed eight days in the bay, then ran northward along the coast,
discovering the archipelago named after him, and himself naming Rosemary
Island, which lies off the coast close to Roeburne, the chief town of the
north province of the colony. From here he continued his course north till
he reached Roebuck Bay, a few leagues to the south of the scene of his
first visit, and where is now the town of Broome. The Eastern Extension
Telegraph Cable Company's alternative cable from Banjoewangi comes in
here, and the town has additional importance as being the harbour for a
large pearling fleet.
Dampier left here on September 5th, intending again to land further north,
but he abandoned the idea and directed his course for Timor. After he left
Timor he called at New Guinea, discovered and named New Britain, now a
German colonial possession, spent some weeks upon the New Guinea coast,
and then returned to Timor, whence he began his voyage home. Off Ascension
the _Roebuck_ sprang a leak and foundered. Her company, who with
difficulty saved their lives, landed upon Ascension, where they remained
till they were rescued and brought to England in the _Canterbury_, East
Indiaman.
During his stay on the coast of New Guinea Dampier, besides those
discoveries already enumerated, made others, and the frequent appearance
of his name on a modern chart of this coast still commemorates them.
Of Dampier's personality his writings give us little insight. As a good
writer should, he keeps his private affairs out of his book, but how much
we should have been interested in knowing something of the man's shore
life! Mr. Clark Russell in his admirable sketch of Dampier, for example,
takes it for granted that he never married, at any rate during his sea
career. Dampier himself tells us he was married, and gives us a very good
idea of when, but he so seldom, after once getting to work upon his
narrative, gives us a glimpse of himself that it is easily understood how
Mr. Russell came to miss that passage in the _Voyage round the World_ in
which the old sailor tells us how in 1687 he named an island the Duke of
Grafton's Isle "as soon as we all landed on it, having married my wife out
of the Duchess's family and leaving her at Arlington House at my going
abroad."
He was, perhaps, not a great man, though a good sailor, who had certain
qualities which placed him above his fellows. We imagine somehow that his
expressed pious dislike for buccaneering was not altogether the cause of
his abandoning the life, and that when he set out upon his career as an
explorer the search for a land where gold could be easily got without
fighting for it was his main motive. He himself tells us so, but we think
that he might have been a greater man if his mind had been capable of a
little higher aim than the easy getting of riches. The obscurity of his
end is not remarkable when one considers how little was then thought of
the value of his discoveries. It took many years for Cook's survey of New
Holland to bring forth fruits.
In his third volume, written after his return from Ascension, he says:--
"It has always been the fate of those who have made new
discoveries to be disesteemed and slightly spoken of by such as
either have had no true relish and value for the things themselves
that are discovered, or have had some prejudice against the
persons by whom the discoveries were made. It would be vain,
therefore, and unreasonable in me to expect to escape the censure
of all, or to hope for better treatment than far worthier persons
have met with before me. But this satisfaction I am sure of
having, that the things themselves in the discovery of which I
have been employed are most worthy of our diligent search and
inquiry, being the various and wonderful works of God in different
parts of the world; and, however unfit a person I may be in other
respects to have undertaken this task, yet, at least, I have given
a faithful account, and have found some things undiscovered by any
before, and which may at least be some assistance and direction to
better qualified persons who shall come after me."
This is a very fair summary of his work, and in his dedication of his book
to the Earl of Pembroke he says truly enough:--
"The world is apt to judge of everything by its success; and
whoever has ill-fortune will hardly be allowed a good name. This,
my lord, was my unhappiness in my late expedition in the
_Roebuck_, which foundered through perfect age near the island of
Ascension. I suffered extremely in my reputation by that
misfortune, though I comfort myself with the thoughts that my
enemies could not charge any neglect upon me."
Upon his return from the _Roebuck_ voyage his next exploit was the command
of a privateering expedition consisting of the _St. George_ and the
_Cinque Ports_, equipped by a company to cruise [Sidenote: 1715]
against the Spaniards in the South Seas. He sailed upon this voyage in
April, 1703, first having the honour of a presentation by the Lord High
Admiral to the new Queen (Anne). It is well known that the voyage was a
failure, and how Dampier, in command of the _St. George_, quarrelled with
Funnel, in command of the _Cinque Ports_. After this voyage he began his
downward career, and the next heard of him is when he sailed as pilot on
the well-known Woodes Rogers expedition, returning in 1711 a very small
sharer in booty to the value of about £150,000.
It was on this voyage that Alexander Selkirk was found upon Juan
Fernandez, and Woodes Rogers learned from his pilot, Captain Dampier, how
the man had been left upon the island more than four years before from the
_Cinque Ports_, and that Selkirk was the best man in her, and so Rogers
took him on board his ship.
This, so far as written story goes, is the last of Dampier, and nothing is
known of how he spent his declining days. The discovery of his will proves
that he died in Coleman Street, St. Stephen's, London, some time in 1715.
The will does not mention the value of his property, but he could not
have died rich, and was probably not only poor, but, to judge by the fact
of his death not having been recorded by his contemporaries, must have
been almost, so far as the great folks who once patronized him were
concerned, friendless.