Page:New history of Botanybay (sic) and Port Jackson.pdf/2



AN DIEMEN's LAND was so named by one Tasman, who first discovered it, in the year 1642; from that time it escaped all further notice by European navigators till Captain Furneaux touched at it in March 1773. In the year 1776, Captain Cook, whose professional skill in Navigation had never been equalled by any in this kingdom, was called on, in consequence of an order of his late majesty, for making discoveries in the Southern Hemisphere, by which he accomplished a very important purpose, in ascertaining that immense tract in this Southern clime, called New Holland, to be an island, which had ever before been supposed to be continental.

This great and extensive Island, being the largest in the known world, extends from Van Diemen's Land, in the South-west, to C. F. De Witt's Land no less than two thousand four hundred English miles; and from North to South, not less than two thousand, three hundred: So that, instead of an Island, the claim of New Holland, to be called a continent, will be indisputable.