[* Resolution of the “Heeren XVII”, August 25, 1692; see also p. 60 infra.]

[** As regards this see J F GEBHARD Het leven van Witsen I., pp. 480 f.:  II. pp. 260 f. (Letter of Witsen to “Dr. Martin Lister, fellow of the Colledge of Physicians and R. S., concerning some late observations in Nova Hollandia” October 3, 1698), pp. 299 f. (Letter to Gijsbert Cuper at Deventer, 1698?) pp. 407, 414, 416]

[*** Witsen to Cuper, August 1, 1712 (GEBHARD p. 480).]

“The which is sorely to be regretted!"...The times of Van Diemen had failed to return; the spirit by which he was imbued no longer presided over the debates on colonial matters.  But his name is indissolubly bound up with the palmy days of Dutch discovery in the Far East, initiated by the East India Company.

Fortunately, in our time Holland again bears a part in what is done by cultured Europe for the scientific exploration of the unknown regions of the world.  In this field of inquiry the nineteenth century has again beheld her sons take a place which the achievements of their forefathers have as it were by right of inheritance assigned to them.

* * * * * * * *

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DOCUMENTS.

I.

(1595) DUTCH NOTIONS RESPECTING THE SOUTH-LAND IN 1595.

Itinerario, Voyage ofte Schipvaert, van JAN HUYGEN VAN LINSCHOTEN naer Oost ofte Portugaels Indien [Itinerary, Voyage or Navigation of J. H. v.  L. to Eastern or Portuguese India]...t’ Amstelredam.  By Cornelis Claesz opt Water, in ’t Schrijf-boeck by de Oude Brugghe.  Anno CIC.IC.XCVI (1596?-Ed.)[*].

[* There may have been an earlier edition of this book.  At all events, the Netherlanders who in 1595 undertook the first voyage from Holland to India, were acquainted with the work either in manuscript or in print.  See the journal of this voyage, kept by Frank Van der Does, one of the sharers of the expedition, and printed in the second volume of J. K. J. De JONGE’S well-known book:  De Opkomst van het Nederlandsch gezag in Oost-Indie [The Rise of the Dutch power in the East Indies] (’s Gravenhage, Amsterdam MDCCCLXIV), pp. 287-372.  It may safely be assumed that Van Linschoten’s book contains everything that the Dutch knew of the East, when in 1595 Dutch vessels were first sent out to those remote regions.  Charts Nos 1 (a part of the Orbis terrarum combmdiosa descriptio.  Antverpiae apud joafiem Baptistam Vrient), and 2 (a part of the Exacta & accurata delineatio cum orarum maritimarum tum eijam locorum terrestrium quae in regionibus Chiua...una cum omnium vicinarum instilarum descriptjone ut sunt Sumatra, Java utraque...) give a survey of this knowledge so far as our present purpose is concerned.  I have made use of a copy of Van Linschoten’s work in the library of the Leyden University.]

Pag. 25.  Chapter the Twentieth.