"
Endeavour River, Cape Flattery, Providential Channel, and other names on
the chart commemorate the accident; yet after all this trouble Cook
continued his survey, sailing safely through the cluster of rocks between
New Guinea and the mainland. This passage and the Barrier Reef are
probably two of the most dangerous places in the world, and more vessels
have been wrecked on that bit of coast between the southern end of the
Barrier Reef and the Indian Ocean side of Torres Straits than on any
similar stretch of coast-line anywhere.
So far the voyage had been without other disaster than this, but on the
way back the _Endeavour_ put into Batavia to refresh, and in a letter to
the Secretary of the Admiralty, dated the 9th of May, 1771, Cook wrote:--
"That uninterrupted state of health we have all along enjoyed was,
soon after our arrival at Batavia, succeeded by a general
sickness, which delayed us there so much that it was the 20th of
December before we were able to leave that place. We were
fortunate enough to loose but few men at Batavia, but on our
passage from thence to the Cape of Good Hope we had twenty-four
men died, all, or most of them, of the bloody flux. This fatal
disorder reign'd in the ship with such obstinacy that medicines,
however skilfully administered, had not the least effect. I
arrived at the Cape on the 14th of March, and quitted it again on
the 14th of April, and on the 1st of May arrived at St.
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