The anxiety of the Dutch government at Batavia, to know how far the SOUTH LANDS might extend towards the antarctic circle, was the cause of Tasman being sent with two vessels, to ascertain this point; and the discovery of Van Diemen’s Land was one of the results.  It was not, however, the policy of the Dutch government to make discoveries for the benefit of general knowledge; and accordingly this voyage “was never,” says Dr. Campbell, “published intire; and it is probable, that the East-India Company never intended it should be published at all.  However, Dirk Rembrantz, moved by the excellency and accuracy of the work, published in Low Dutch an extract of captain Tasman’s journal, which has ever since been considered as a great curiosity; and as such, has been translated into many languages.” *

[* Complete Collection of Voyages and Travels, originally published by John Harris, D. D. and F. R. S. London, 1744.  Vol.  I. page 325.]

If a judgment may be formed from the translations, Rembrantz must have omitted great part of the nautical details concerning Van Diemen’s Land, a defect which is remedied in the following account.  It is taken from a journal containing, besides the daily transactions and observations throughout the whole voyage, a series of thirty-eight manuscript charts, views, and figures.  The expression by me, which often occurs in it, and followed by the signature Abel Jansz Tasman, shows that if this were not his original journal, it is a copy from it:  probably one made on board for the governor and council of Batavia.  With this interesting document, and a translation made in 1776, by Mr. C. G. Woide, chaplain of His Majesty’s Dutch chapel at St. James’s, I was favoured by the Right Hon. SIR JOSEPH BANKS.*

[* I am proud to take this opportunity of publicly expressing my obligations to the Right Hon. President of the Royal Society; and of thus adding my voice to the many who, in the pursuit of science, have found in him a friend and patron.  Such he proved in the commencement of my voyage, and in the whole course of its duration; in the distresses which tyranny heaped upon those of accident; and after they were overcome.  His extensive and valuable library has been laid open; and has furnished much that no time or expense, within my reach, could otherwise have procured.]

TASMAN. 1642. (Atlas.  Plate VII.)

CAPTAIN ABEL JANSZ TASMAN sailed from Batavia on Aug. 14, 1642, with the yacht Heemskerk and fly-boat Zeehaan; and, after touching at Mauritius, steered south and eastward upon discovery.  Nov. 24, at four p.m., high land was seen in the E. by N., supposed to be distant forty miles.  The ships steered towards it till the evening; when there were high mountains visible in the E. S. E., and two smaller ones in the N. E. They sounded in 100 fathoms, and then stood off from the land, with the wind at south-east.