CAPTAIN COOK

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 119, 15 November 1929, Page 19

CAPTAIN COOK

COLUMBUS OF THE SOUTH MEMORIALS OF GREATNESS That the latest life atory of Captain Cook should have been written by a Frenchman, is sufficient proof that English-speaking people are not alone ia regarding this oia navigator as ■worthy to be remembered, says a writer ia the Adelaide "Observer." But there is no country in which Captain Cook is honoured in quite the same way as-in Australia, whose eastern coast he discovered and surveyed. Every Australian who can possibly manage it, carries about with him at least one picture of the famous captain. The more pictures of" the national hero any-of.us can acquire, the better we are pleased about it. There is a fierce and continuous struggle for the possession of these memorials of greatness. . Captain Cook is tho central figure in the group which graces the back of tho Commonwealth of Australia one pound note. . ■ ■. ~ A year or two ago this fact led to an interesting argument.. People who are sensitive about our treatment of the aboriginal inhabitants of this counr try said, it was. a very unfortunate thing that every Australian pound note should bear;a picture of a. white man shooting a. black. PICTURES AND POUNDS. The picture ahows Captain Cook's landing at Botany Bay. He has just ■tepped ashore, • accompanied- -by- Sir Joseph Banks and Dr. Solander, and some of the members of:the crew of the Endeavour. . Thero is also a marine, rand" the artist has caught this man. in the very act: of kneeling to take a pot shot at two blackfellows on a slight eminence a hundred yards off. Behind him are two sailors armed with rifles. ; , It seems to.be their intention to have' a shot at the enemy if the marine. ..misses.- .... ■. . Perhaps this is 'not quite the right picture for.a,nation with a guilty conscience on the native question; but those who defend the artist are entitled to point out that Captain Cook's arm is outstretched in a manner which would be quite consistent with his saying, "Now, you fellows, don't all shoot at once!" Captain Cook was not a bloodthirsty person. He had discovered the coast of a new country, and had naturally made up his mind to land, in spite of every obstacle that might be put in his way. • ■ ■■ Off Bulli; on;. 27th April, 1770, he launched the ■ ship's pinnace, which leaked, and had to be hoisted in again. Then, he pulled towards the shore in the yawl, but the.surf was running bq high that he dared' not attempt a landing. Next day, the Endeavour entered Botany Bay—so named afterwards because Sir Joseph Banks found it an excellent place to botaniße in—and anchored off a small aboriginal village. The villagers, we are told, could be seen, fishing and cooking their food, as' though nothing very much out of the way was happening off-shore. • TWO BLACK HOPESr "When, a couple of the ship's boats began to approach the beach, however, the blacks "realised' that' somefEing was wrong. "With the exception of two men, they all disappeared.' The two black champions, each with a -bundle ©£ awaited tho arrival of the invaders. They Bhouted and gesticulated in what they imagined to be a very threa-tening-manngr.. ...Captain Cook had with him as interpreter a Tahitian, iamed Tupia, but Tupia couldn't make anything of them. Captain Cook thought he would try the uni■yersal language of gunpowder, and ordered a gun to be fired between the defenders of the Australian continent. At this, the younger man dropped his spears in alarm, but snatched them up again and joined in a wellordered retreat. The elder man, fighta rearguard action, threw a stone At the boats, and Captain Cook ordered another shot to be fired. - "i The weapon used was probably a fowling piece, for the old warrior is said to have been struck-on. the legs "by the pellets, and to have responded, poor fellow, by running off to his hut for a shield. .During this interlude, Cook stepped on short, and the plucky pair of blackfellows rallied and hurled their spears —"throwed two darts at us," as the Captain expresses it. "This obliged me to fire a third shot, soon after which they both made off." This is the incident depicted, possibly with very fair accuracy, on the back of our one" pound note. The firstact of annexation was fortunately accompanied without' killing anybody. -: A BURIAL. -Two days later, however, one of the seamen of the Endeavour died. Perhaps we have his portrait, too, on the pound note. Formby Sutherland was his -name, and he was buried on shore, the first Englishman to find a resting place in Australian soil. "This," writes Cook, "occasioned my calling the south point of the bay Point Sutherland."-: 'Cook's landing place was known to the natives aa Kundel, a name which eventually changed itself to Kurnell. Here, in 1822, a tablet was erected to. commemorate the fame of "James Cook and Joseph Banks, the Columbus and Maecenas of their time," and Barron Field, the friend of Charles Lamb', wrote these lines in honour-of the occasion:— Sere fix the tablet. This must be the ; place ■ . ■■ ■ "Where our Columbus of the South did : land; '■.. \ He saw the Indian village on the sand, And on this rock first met the simple race • Q£ Austral Indians, who preaum'd to '/ face ■■■.-.■■ With lance and spear his musket. Close -;, at hand Is the clear stream, from whence his .' vent'rous band •■■- .. Eefresh'd their ship, and thence a.little space ..■ .. t-. . Lies Sutherland, their shipmate; for

: the sound Of Christian burial better did pro

claim Possession than the flag of England's name.