MONUMENT TO LA PEROUSE.

Within the entrance of the bay, on the northern side, stands a monument* erected to the memory of La Perouse, that being the last spot at which the distinguished navigator was heard of, from 1788, until 1826, when the Chevalier Dillon was furnished with a clue to his melancholy fate by finding the handle of a French sword fastened to another blade in the possession of a native of Tucopia, one of the Polynesian group.  By this means he was enabled to trace him to the island of Mannicolo, on the reefs fronting which his ship was lost.

(Footnote.  On the eastern side is engraven:  A la Memoire de Monsieur de la Perouse.  Cette terre qu’il visita en MDCCLXXXVIII. est la derniere d’ou il a fait parvenir de ses nouvelles.

Also:  Erige au nom de la France par les soins de MM. de Bougainville et Du Campier, commandant la fregate La Thetis, et la corvette L’Esperance, en relache au Port Jackson, en MDCCCXXV.

On the western side:  This place, visited by Monsieur de la Perouse in the year MDCCLXXXVIII, is the last whence any accounts of him have been received.

Also:  Erected in the name of France by MM. de Bougainville and du Campier, commanding the frigate the Thetis and the corvette the Hope, lying in Port Jackson, A.D.  MDCCCXXV.

On the north:  Le fondement pose en 1825; eleve en 1828.

On the south:  Foundation laid in 1825, completed 1828.)

Close by, on the same point, stands the tomb of a French Catholic priest, named Le Receveur, who accompanied La Perouse, as naturalist, in his circumnavigation of the globe, and died at this great distance from his native land.  A large stump of a tree rising near, “marks out the sad spot” where lie mouldering the bones of the wanderer in search of materials to enrich the stores of science.  No doubt many a hope of future fame expired in that man’s breast as he sank into his last sleep in a foreign clime, far from his home and friends and relations, such as his order allowed him to possess.  The applause of the world, which doubtless he fancied would have greeted his labours at the end of his perilous journey, he was now robbed of; and he must have felt that few would ever recollect his name, save the rare voyager who, like myself, having encountered the same dangers that he had braved, should chance to read his short history on the narrow page of stone that rests above his grave.

CAPE SOLANDER.

Another object of greater interest to the Englishman is observable on Cape Solander, the opposite point of the bay.  It is a plate set in the rock, recording the first visit of the immortal Cook, to whose enterprise the colonists are indebted for the land that yields them their riches, and which must now be invested in their eyes with all the sanctity of home.  Surely it would become them to evince a more filial reverence for the man who must be regarded as in some respects the father of the colony.  Let us hope that they will one day raise a monument to his memory, which to be worthy of him must be worthy of themselves—­something to point out to future generations the spot at which the first white man’s foot touched the shore, and where civilisation was first brought in contact with the new continent.