Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 12.djvu/74

 serious reflections, which afterwards bore most noble fruit.

The success of the voyage and the importance of the discoveries were, however, universally recognised. Cook was promoted to commander's rank, 19 Aug. 1771, and was appointed to the command of a new expedition for the exploration of the Pacific, which sailed from Plymouth on 13 July 1772. This expedition consisted of two ships—the Resolution of 460 tons, of which Cook had the immediate command, and the Adventure of 330 tons, commanded by Captain Tobias Furneaux [q. v.] —and carried a competent staff of astronomers, naturalists, and artists, including Dr. Johann Reinhold Forster and his son Georg. Reversing the order of all previous circumnavigations, it touched, in the outward voyage, at the Cape of Good Hope, and sailed thence eastwards on 22 Nov. The primary object of the expedition was to verify the reports of a great southern continent, and with this view the ships were kept along the edge of the ice, passing the Antarctic circle for the first time on 16 Jan. 1773. In the fogs of the high latitudes the two ships were separated (8 Feb.), and the Resolution arrived alone at New Zealand, having traversed nearly four thousand leagues without seeing land. After resting and refreshing his ship's company in Dusky Bay, Cook proceeded to Queen Charlotte's Sound, where on 18 May he fortunately fell in with the Adventure; but after a cruise to Tahiti, in the course of which the position of numerous islands was noted or rectified, on returning to New Zealand the ships were again and finally separated (30 Oct.) Sailing, then, alone once more to the south, the Resolution fell in with the ice in lat. 62° 10′ S., passed the Antarctic circle for the second time in long. 147° 46′ W., and on 27 Jan. 1774 attained her highest southern latitude, 71° 10′ in long. 106° 54′ W. All attempts to penetrate further to the south were vain, and as the season advanced, Cook, turning north, reached Easter Island, having been 104 days out of sight of land. The months of the southern winter were spent in intertropical cruising, in the course of which the New Hebrides were explored and New Caledonia was discovered. In October the Resolution arrived again at New Zealand, and Cook determined, as the last chance of finding a southern continent, to examine the high latitudes south of Cape Horn and the Atlantic Ocean. In the course of this cruise he discovered or rediscovered the large island which he named Southern Georgia, on 14 Jan. 1775, and some days later he sighted Sandwich Land. On 21 March the Resolution anchored in Table Bay, and arrived at Plymouth on 29 July. The Adventure had preceded her by more than a year.

The geographical discoveries made by Cook in this voyage were both numerous and important; and by proving the non-existence of the great southern continent, which had for so long been a favoured myth, he established our knowledge of the Southern Pacific on a sound basis. In fact the maps of that part of the world still remain essentially as he left them, though, of course, much has been done in perfecting the details. But the most important discovery of all was the possibility of keeping a ship's company at sea without serious loss from sickness and death. When we read the accounts of the older voyages, those of Anson, of Carteret, or even of Cook himself, and notice that in this second voyage only one man died of disease out of a complement of 118, and that notwithstanding the great length, duration, and hardships of the several cruises, we shall the more fully realise the value of Cook's discovery. The men throughout the voyage were remarkably free from scurvy, and the dreaded fever was unknown. Of the measures and precautions adopted to attain this result a detailed account was read before the Royal Society (7 March 1776), which acknowledged the addition thus made to hygienic science, as well as the important service to the maritime world and humanity, by the award of the Copley gold medal. The paper is printed in ‘Phil. Trans.’ (vol. lxvi. appendix, p. 39).

Within a few days of his return (9 Aug. 1775) Cook was promoted to the rank of captain, and received an appointment to Greenwich Hospital. But it being shortly afterwards determined to send an expedition into the North Pacific to search for a passage round the north of America, he at once offered himself to go in command of it. The offer was gladly accepted, and Cook, again in the Resolution, sailed from Plymouth on 12 July 1776, followed on 1 Aug. by the Discovery, under the command of Captain Charles Clerke [q. v.], which joined the Resolution at the Cape of Good Hope on 10 Nov. The two ships sailed together from the Cape on 30 Nov., touched at Van Diemen's Land and New Zealand, and spent the following year among the islands of the South Pacific. On 22 Dec. 1777 they crossed the line, and, discovering the Sandwich Islands on their way, made the west coast of America, in lat. 44° 55′ N., on 7 March 1778. They then turned to the north, along the coast, making a nearly continuous running survey as far north as Icy Cape, from which, unable to penetrate further,they turned back on 29 Aug.;