Page:Captain Cook's Journal during His First Voyage Round the World.djvu/46

xl their parallel, to seek once more for Bouvet's Islands to the eastward.

He found nothing, and on February 26th steered for the Cape of Good Hope, even he being glad to leave this trying, tempestuous latitude. On March 23rd he anchored in Table Bay, having learnt from some vessels outside of the safe arrival of the Adventure in England the year before, and of her boat's crew having been eaten by the Maoris, which cleared up the mystery of the wrecked ship.

The Resolution finally arrived at Spithead on July 29th, 1775, after an absence of three years and eighteen days.

Captain Furneaux had, on leaving New Zealand, sailed straight for Cape Horn, the Cape of Good Hope, and England, arriving just a year before the Resolution.

Cook speaks most warmly of Captain Furneaux; but one cannot help contrasting his action with Cook's. Left, by the separation, his own master, he might have continued exploration, as did Cook. His ship was staunch, his provisions in much the same condition as the Resolution's; but he went straight home. His crew had suffered from scurvy, whereas Cook's had not; but he says not one word of this, nor does he give any reason why he gave up any further thought of the objects of the voyage, except a search for Bouvet's Islands, which he also looked for on his way.

It was the indomitable perseverance that led Cook to act so differently that raised his reputation so far above all other leaders.

Thus ended this very remarkable voyage. Never was a ship's crew exposed to more continual hardships, with so little to keep up interest and excitement, as the people of the Resolution; and yet Cook is able to record, with allowable pride, that only four lives had been lost, and only one by a sickness contracted before leaving England.

Once more the scurvy was defeated; and, without a doubt, owing to the intelligent action and untiring supervision of the captain. He gives a full description of the measures adopted, and while giving full acknowledgment to the anti-scorbutics with which he was supplied, he is of opinion that the general sanitary precautions formed the best prevention. Cleanliness of persons, bedding, clothes, and ship, were continually enforced. All these were foreign to the sailors of the time, and extraordinary it is that it was a man born in the lower rank of life, and brought up in a collier, who had the sense to perceive that in these lay the surest preventatives against this paralysing scourge.

Cook was promoted to captain—a proud position for the collier boy—and elected a Fellow of the Royal Society; perhaps even a greater distinction for a man of his bringing up. He contributed