CAPTAIN COOK'S SHIP.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XLIX, Issue 13907, 7 November 1919, Page 3

CAPTAIN COOK'S SHIP.

HOW WAS SHE RIGGED? Statements have recently appeared in print to the effect that whereas the popular conception as to the historic vessel in which Captain Cook sailed along the Australian coast is tiiat she was a bri§, she was really a brigantine, a term applied to a two-masted vessel, square-rigged on the foremast only. It can, however, be afiirmed with perfect safety that nobody possessed of even a superficial acquaintance with ibe voyages of the illustrious navigator would assert that the Endeavour was a brigantine, any more than that she was a super-Dreadnought, writes T.F.M. in the Melbourne "Argus." Nor is it true that the popular conception is that she was a brig. The orthodox belief is that the Endeavour was a barque, and as that belief is fully substantiated by unimpeachable evidence, it is distressing to h'nd on view in the Vei'don Gallery of the Melbourne Public Library what purports ti, be a model of Cook's vessel, which distinctly gives the impression that she. was, technically, a "ship," i.e., a vessel square-rigged on all her three masts. The fabricator of this model is the Sydney artist, .Mr Norman Lindsay, who is obviously a gentleman endowed with great courage, seeing that in what is alleged to be a recreation in miniature of the original Kndeavour. he sets at utter defiance the opinions of everybody possessed of any valid claim to recognition as an authority on the subject. It is doubtiul if any living man could say exactly what, this vessel was like, but many men can still be found who are fully competent to say that she bore but a very slight, resemblance to Mr Lindsay's work of art. In all official documents of the period the Endeavour was explicitly termed a barque -or "bark," as the word was then spelt—and although every craft that rales the waters is a "bark" to the inspired poet, the Admiralty officials were not attempting any poetic flights when they applied the term to Cook's vessel. They did so in order to avoid confusion between her and n naval cutter of the same name, then stationed at the Nore. And if Cook's vessel was actually a fullrigged ship, why did those officials persistently style her a "bark," a word conveying only one meaning, then or now, to practical men? Cook himself, who was anything rather than a Silas Wegg, judged he was in command of a barque. Sir Joseph Banks and every one else on board her harboured a similar belief, as did Hawkesworth and all of Cook's biographers, including the late Admiral Sir William Wharton, than whom no better authority on such a question can he found. Mr Lindsay is positively the first to assail the unanimous verdict thus recorded, which he does by means of a production bearing more than a passing resemblance to the model now in the Whitby Museum of the vessel in which Cook made his two later voyages, viz., the Resolution. That craft was admittedly a "ship," and of a tonnage greatly exceeding that of the Endeavour. Both vessels were originallv North Sea colliers, and positively nobody, dead or living, ever set eyes on a vessel of the Endeavour's build and size (260 tons register), which was rigged in the way Mr Lindsay, has rigged his model. In one of the logs of the voyage an isolated entry appears that—if accepted as being meticulously accurate—might lend a slight measure'of support to the fantastic hypothesis that the Endeavour was a full-rigged ship. But when that particular entry is collated with the entries appearing in other logs under the same date, it becomes evident that Mr

[ Lindsay has jumped to a conclusion quite unwarranted. There isro a- many as ten journals of Cook's oiliccrs and men deposited in the Record Office, in London, ami in making deductions from the published copies of these, car;; must be taken to avoid conclusions tuat may seem plausible at lirst sip lit. and yet' on it closer investigation prove to lie utterly fallacious. Eirors abound in each and all of the. journals, and .Mr Lindsay has brought his model to grief because he seems to have ignored the admirable maxim. "Be sure, "be sure, but not too sure." In addition to its cardinal defect, the production under erilLism falls short in other respects of being, as it is claimed to be, a faithful representation of the original vessel. The Endeavour, was a bluff-bowed Geordie, and would therefore have the upright stem, vhich all vessels of that type certainly had, but -Mr Lindsay's model does not 'possess this essential feature n|" the Geordie; nor does its hull, taking it altogether, show much resemblance to the hull ul' the Endeavour, as sketched by the artist Bnchan, who sailed in her', and might, therefore, be expected to have a tolerably accurate idea of tin- vessel's general appearance.

Again, she had exactly a hundred per' son:', on board when she lelt .-he shores of England, yet Mr Lindsay equips his model with only two boats, which is paying but a pool' compliment to the foresight and humane feelings of Cook and the. Hritish Admiralty. The. fact is. however, that the vessel had three boats- -a yaw'l, a pinnace, and a long boat— in constant use as she nosed hei way from Point Hicks, the present Cape Con ran. to Torres Straits, and probably there would have been other boats available in case of emergency, it is likewise a fact- beyond dispute that the vessel was sheathed in wpnd, but Mr Lindsay has seen fit to .sheath his alleged rcieation in copper. It also shows the blue ension hanging from its gaff-end, wheieas it is a moral certainty that the Endeavour displayed the white ensign of the Hritish Navy. We are explicitly told that Ibe Reso.ution llew that on.-ign. so why not the Endeavour"; there are still other defects nolicea.bli in this work of ait, but enough has been said to show that Mr Lindsay's effort however well meant, distinctly tends to propagate utterly wrong notions concerning the vessel -o closely connected with the genesis of our Australian history. Our annals already furnish numerous illustrations ot bow difficult it is to overtake errors, however preposterous {hey may be, once they ba.ve obtained a good lead - , so it is highly desirable tint they should be nipped in the bud—like Boyle Roche's rat. That being admitted, if would seem that the . gcntUMien responsible for the acquisition and public exhibition of this model—the Felton Bequest committee—are called upon to adduce reasons in justification of their action.