On the 23rd do.  Latitude 26 deg. 3’; during the last twenty-four hours we mostly drifted in a calm at about 3 or 4 miles’ distance from the coast; here we sighted a large inlet, looking like a river or bay.  We sounded in 80 fathom, good sandy bottom; in the afternoon there was a light breeze from the South-south-west, our course being North-west by West.  In the evening we saw the farthest extremity of the land north by east at six miles’ distance from us.

On the 26th do.  Latitude 25 deg. 48’, we did our best to keep off the land, which extended North-north-west and East-south-east.  The land looked like the west-coast of England with many reddish rocks; out at sea there were plenty of cliffs and sunken rocks; at noon the wind went round to South-west afterwards to the south; we held our course North-west by North.  In the evening the endmost land lay North by east of us at about 7 miles’ distance.

On the 27th do.  WILLEMTGEN JANSZ., wedded wife Of WILLEM JANSZ. of Amsterdam, midshipman, was delivered of a son, who got the name of SEEBAER VAN NIEMELANT.  At noon Latitude 24 deg. 15’, sailed northward both in a calm and with variable winds, generally on a North-by-west course...[*] miles, our course being north, and the wind south with a fine breeze.

[* Left blank.]

On the 29th do.  Latitude 20 deg. 56’.

On the 30th do.  Latitude 18 deg. 56’; the wind being east, we could not get higher than north.  We saw a good deal of rock-weed floating about, and plenty of fish near the ship...

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{Page 50}

XVI.

(1624) DISCOVERY OF THE TORTELDUIF ISLAND (ROCK).

A.

Daily Register [*] of what has happened here at Batavia from the first of January, A.D. 1627.

[* This Daily Register has been edited by me (’s Gravenhage, Nijhoff, 1896).]

...On the 21st [of June] there arrived here from the Netherlands the advice-yacht Tortelduiff...which had left the Texel...on the 16th of November, 1623...

B.

Hessel Gerritsz Charts, 1627 [*] (Nos. 4 and 5.—­VII, C, D).

[* The situation of Tortelduif island was accordingly known as early as 1677.  The voyage Of 1623-1624 is the only one made to India by the ship of that name (see LEUPE, Zuidland, p. 48).  If we take for granted that this ship gave its name to the island (rock), which is highly probable, then the name must have been conferred in 1624.  The note of interrogation in the text is only meant to ward off the charge of over-hasty inference on my part.]

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XVII.

(1626) VOYAGE OF THE SHIP LEIJDEN, COMMANDED BY SKIPPER DANIEL JANSSEN COCK, FROM THE NETHERLANDS TO JAVA.—­FURTHER DISCOVERY OF THE WEST-COAST OF AUSTRALIA.

Copy of the Journal kept by me DANIEL JANSSEN COCK, Captain and Skipper of the ship LEIJDEN, which set sail on the 17th of May 1625, of all that has occurred during the voyage.