The bold explorers met with so many stirring
adventures that the present writers can only "reel off the yarn," and let
lovers of topography go, if they are so inclined, to the charts, and study
how much valuable map-making, as well as exciting incident, these young
men crowded into their lives.
When Hunter returned to New South Wales in the _Reliance_ to take office
as governor, he brought with him Matthew Flinders as second lieutenant;
and to Sir Joseph Banks, whose influence secured the appointment, this is
only one of the many debts of gratitude owed by New South Wales for his
foresight and honesty in making such selections. Flinders was then
twenty-one years of age. His father was a surgeon at Donington, a village
in Lincolnshire.
[Illustration: GEORGE BASS. From a miniature. From "The Historical
Records of New South Wales" [Sydney, 1889, etc.]. _To face p._ 168.]
_Robinson Crusoe_, so he himself tells us, sent him to sea, and his
departure from home was soon followed by that of his brother Samuel.
Matthew served first in the _Scipio_ under Pasley; then he accompanied
Bligh in the _Providence_ to Tahiti, and thence to the West Indies (this
was Bligh's successful bread-fruit voyage); then he was in the
_Bellerophon_, and was present at Lord Howe's victory, "the glorious 1st
of June." Two months later he left in the _Reliance_ for Sydney.
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