HUNDRED YEARS AGO

Wairarapa Times-Age, 1 April 1940, Page 9

HUNDRED YEARS AGO

GREAT FRENCH NAVIGATOR’S VOYAGE OTAGO HARBOUR CHARTED. EXPLORATIONS IN ANTARCTIC. One hundred years ago the great French navigator, Jules Sebastien Cesar Dumon d'Urville, was returning from his exploring voyage to the Antarctic. On March 30, 1840, his two ships, the Astrolabe and Zelee, dropped anchor in Otago Harbour. It was by no means his first voyage to this country. In the Coquille, as an officer under the command of his friend Duperrey, he had visited the Bay of Islands in 1824. In late 1826 and early 1827 Dumont d'Urville, himself in command of the same vessel, rechristened the Astrolabe, revisited New Zealand, fi making charts and discoveries that Supplemented the work of Cook and -Jlvhose importance is not generally realised in this country. J D’Urville had come up from the An-1 tarctic —he left France on his long , scientific voyage in 1837—by way of the Auckland Islands, which did not impress him much as a site for settlement. All the fish there had worms, and the wood, good for nothing but fuel, gave out a disagreeable odour as it burned. Stewart Island he much preferred. On March 26 as he coasted past the Island a pilot came out offering to lake him into a safe anchorage, but i d'Urville was too anxious to get on to the South Island. However, he bought some fresh fish and vegetables from the pilot and learned that there was a settlement of about twenty Englishmen on the island who lived by selling vegetables and poultry to passing whalers.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS. The first impression that Otago Harbour macle on the French navigator was unfortunate. He had on board the latest English charts —the latest, that is, in 1837, the year he had sailed from Toulon. But these showed’ Cape Saunders as a sharp point, whereas it was actually terminated by a square point, forming high cliffs. The French nearly attempted to enter’ a bay they believed to be Otago Harbour, but were saved from doubt as to their destination by seeing an American ship come out of the real entrance to the Harbour. On the afternoon of March 30 the two ships crossed the bar and came to anchor in a narrow channel. FRIENDS OLD AND NEV/. Dumont d'Urville was pleased to find an old acquaintance at anchor in Otago Harbour, the French whaler Havre, Captain Privat, a ship which he had met on the coast of Chile and which had in the interval been back to France. Three other whalers were at

the port—two American and one British. The place they had chosen to anchor in was so narrow that during t the night the Astrolabe fouled the Havre, only damaging a little of her rigging. Next day d’Urville detailed an officer, M. Duroch, to chart the anchorage, work he hoped would take only three days, while nearly all the other officers went ashore to inspect the surrounding country. They immediately noticed unfavourably the habits and appearance of the local Maoris. Most of them were in European dress, generally in tatters, so that they took on a scarecrow appearance quite foreign to their old dignity. D’Urville decided, though on very short acquaintance, that they lived as hangers-on of the white whalers. even their chief importuning the French with his shameless begging.

Certainly they were abandoning their ancestral arts. TWO VILLAGES. Apart from isolated habitations there were two principal villages. One of these was a collection of about twenty whares, entered by crawling on the stomach, as d’Urville relates, with the usual raised'store houses outside. Then there was a European village, with twelve cottages and gardens, two of the houses being taverns frequented by Europeans and Maoris alike. The Europeans were all whalers.

The French were glad to shoot tuis and pigeons in the forest round the shore. Although a ship's boat penetrated to the limit of navigation, d’Urville was severely handicapped from personal exploration by a sharp attack of gout. The soil, however, he thought good, except for stretches of sand. The local Maoris were very eager to sell’ their land, though it was suspected that it had been “sold” before. In any case officers in the French navy were unlikely to be tempted to join the little colony of whalers. On April 3, 1840, the Astrolabe and the Zelee sailed away, coasting north to call at Akaroa and the Bay of Is-, lands, charting as they went, to reach France in November, 1840. Dumont d’Urville was a man of intellect, as well as' an officer who had seen extensive service in the French navy. He was the greatest of the French navigators who explored New Zealand, and was second only to Captain Cook. He had realised the possibilities of the southern districts of New Zealand, indeed of New Zealand as a whole. He had certainly appreciated its wild, out-' landish beauty.