■ beautiful ; but, in the fpace of a few days, her multiplicity
of charms became infipid and uniform in his eyes. And
yet this traveller affures us, that he was aftronomer, bota-
nift, zoologift, mineralogift, chymift, and philofopher !
We quitted the fhores of New Zeeland with ideas very
different from thofe of Abbé Chappe ; and if any thing alleviated
the drearinefs of the profpedt with a great part of
•our fhip-mates, it was the hope of completing the circle
round the South-Pole in a high latitude during the next in-
hofpitable fummer, and of returning to England within the
fpace of eight months. This hope contributed to animate
■ the fpirits of our people during the greateft part of our continuance
in bad weather ; but in the end it vanilhed like a
dream, and the only thought .which could make them
amends, was the certainty of palling another feafon among
the happy iflands in the torrid zone.
C H A P . IIL
The fecond courfe towards the high■ fouthern latitudes from, New Zee-
land to Eajler IJlrnd,
' I 'HE morning after we had taken our departure, we
had a N. N. W. wind, which raifed the thermometer
to 64 deg. The two next days it flood at 54 deg. then at.
48; and when we were in about 49° of fouth latitude, at
4 4 — deg. On the 2 8 th of November, we obferved a nunr-
ber of feals, or perhaps fea-lions, pafling by us at a distance
towards the land which we had left. From that time
to the 6th of December we daily faw great flocks of blue
and other petrels, together with the different fpecies of al-
batrofles, the fkuas or grey gulls, many pinguins, and
abundance of fea-weed. About feven in the evening, on
that day, we were in the latitude of j t ° 33' fouth, ’and
long. 180°;. confequently juft at the point of the antipodes
of London. The remembrance of domeftic felicity,,
and of the fweets of fociety, called forth a figh from every-
heart which- felt the tender ties of filial or parental affedfion..
We are the firft Europeans, and I believe I may add,, the-
firft human beings, who have reached this point,, where ir
is probable none will come after us. A common report;
prevails indeed in England, concerning Sir Francis Drake,.
whoj
1773.
November»
Saturday 47;-
December*.
Monday 6j -