best agencies are, in my opinion, the secondary school and the university. It will be greatly to the advantage of teachers to share in general culture with the members of other professions. In advocating the fullest possible use of the university and the secondary school in the preparation of our teachers I am but complying with the spirit of the Education Act and of the regulations of the Education Department. In other countries, too, as we have seen, the secondary schools are likely to be more closely linked to the primary schools in the great work of helping to train the teachers of the latter.

In addition to adequate general knowledge, the student who aspires to be a teacher must also have practical training under the direction of some highly-qualified man. To effect this there must be established, as suggested in the regulations of the department, a practising-school, through which all our young teachers should be required to pass.

Under present conditions we cannot hope for the best results, and our educational system, notwithstanding its many excellencies, is maimed and halting. Some reform is needed; but reform to be real and lasting must be preceded by thorough knowledge of the weaknesses and deficiencies of existing arrangements, of what is needed, and of what is aimed at in other countries which are far ahead of us in educational evolution.

ART. XV.-Abel Tasman and his Journal.

By Dr. T. M. HOCKEN, F.L.S.

[Read before the Otago Institute, 10th September, 1895.]

Plate I.

IN fulfilment of a promise made during the last session of this Institute, I have now the pleasure of laying before you a translation, made by myself and my wife, from the original Dutch of that portion of Tasman's Journal relating to the discovery of New Zealand. It is the first time that this has been fully translated.* I shall also give

Translated from "Journaal van de Reis naar het onbekende Zuidland, in den Jare 1642, door Abel Jansz. Tasman, met de Schepen Heemskerck en de Zeehaen. Medegedeeld en met eenige Aanteekeningen voorzien, door Jacob Swart," &c., &c. "Met eene Kaart. Te Amsterdam, bij de Wed. G. Hulst van Keulen, 1860." Tasman's Journal was lost for over two hundred years. When it was found Swart published it in its entirety, as above, in 1860. A copy of this I possess, and from it my translation has been made.

an account of the Journal generally, of the circumstances under which it was written, and of Tasman himself. During the latter part of the sixteenth and the earlier part of the seventeenth century the Dutch were pre-eminently the rulers of the sea. They had superseded the Spanish and the Portuguese, who so long had been in the van of maritime discovery and adventure. Their ships were better built, found, and commanded than had ever been the case before. Their navigation, laws, and rules were for the time of quite an advanced kind; and, with that quiet perseverance and sturdy courage which, under the name of Dutch phlegm, have always been characteristic of the nation, their merchants had secured and held the trade of the world. England's day was then but in high dawn; and, though now she is, and for long has been, the mistress of the seas, at that time she held but a second if not a third place. Early in the seventeenth century Holland penetrated into the Indian Archipelago, and amidst its numberless fertile islands developed amazingly the wealth of her trade. In 1610 she founded the capital of Batavia on the Island of Java, and, though surrounded by hostile native princes or chiefs, she maintained her position and security in this centre. The affairs of this Dutch East India Company were managed by a Governor-General and Council, who, by persistent courage and enterprise, maintained in those parts of the world that renown which their countrymen had won elsewhere. At no period in its history was the company so prosperous and flourishing as between the years 1630 and 1680. That half-century closed, it became involved in the quarrels and politics of the native Javanese States, and then commenced its commercial ruin. In 1636 Antony van Diemen was appointed Governor-General, retaining office for nearly ten years; and no Governor equalled him in energy and sagacity. It was during his rule that Tasman's voyage, of which we are now to speak, was undertaken.

Tasman was born in 1602 or 1603, at Hoorn, in the north of Holland, a town on the borders of the Zuyder Zee, where so many bold sailors were bred, and where, it has been stated, descendants of his family still remain. But, indeed, we know little of Tasman's personal history beyond that contained in his Journal. In this he has truly bequeathed us his monument, though underneath it lies little more than a shadow. An old engraving of him is to be seen in the Christchurch Museum; and it would seem that some personal description is given by M. Dozy in "Bijdragen de Taal Land en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indie" ("Contributions to the Language, Country, and People of Dutch India "), 5th series, vol. ii., p. 308; but of this I know nothing. He died at Batavia in 1659. By direction of Van Diemen he was despatched in 1639,

and soon after his arrival in the settlement, under the command of Captain Matthys Kwast, who was instructed to proceed through the Western Pacific to the Philippines, and there to make search for the fabled Gold and Silver Islands. These are now known as the Bonin Islands, east of Japan. This was most probably Tasman's first voyage under the auspices of the company; at its close he sailed in the Indian seas until 1642, and then commenced his great voyage of dis

covery.

Here it will be interesting to contrast the mode of presentday sailing with that whereby those who went down to the sea in ships in Tasman's time made their truly perilous voyages. Now navigation has been reduced to a fine art, as well as to a precise science-so fine and so precise that it may be generally affirmed that disaster at sea is the result of carelessness, often of gross carelessness. Those floating palaces which now cross the waste of waters in every direction are timed to reach their destination with the punctuality and almost the speed of a railway-train. A few days, or weeks at most, of safe and pleasant travel now represent the weary months of discomfort, dangers real and imaginary, and the scourges of scurvy and dysentery which were too often the lot of those who led the way. All this was first rendered possible by the invention of those instruments, the sextant and chronometer, which now daily tell the sailor his exact position on the trackless ocean. Add to these his accurate chart and nautical tables, and what evil can befall him, unless through great neglect or rare misfortune? When undertaking early voyages of discovery it was usual that two, three, or more vessels should form the fleet. This was a precaution in all ways wise, contributing as it did to mutual courage, safety, and companionship. The commanders and officers formed a committee, or council as they termed it, and whenever any difficulty or dilemma arose the members of this council were summoned by signal aboard the principal vessel of the expedition, and there decided what course was best to follow. These occasions seem to have been frequent, as we can well fancy. The vessels, with their high poop, high forecastle, and round bows must have looked picturesque enough. They were greatly foreshortened, too, for it was considered that a vessel whose length much exceeded its breadth was absolutely unsafe and not unlikely to capsize. Four or five knots an hour was good average sailing; much more frequently the distance traversed in a day did not exceed fifty or sixty miles. The tonnage of those early vessels varied much some measured 300 or even 400 tons; but the perils of many a long voyage were encountered in little vessels of no more than 40, 60, or 120 tons burthen. The dietary scale in Tasman's

time was something as follows: To each man-one good cheese for the whole voyage; three pounds of biscuit, a quartern of vinegar, and half a pound of butter per week; on Sunday, three-quarters of a pound of meat; on Monday and Wednesday, 6oz. of salted cod; on Tuesday and Saturday, a quarter of a pound of stock-fish; on Thursday and Friday, three-quarters of a pound of bacon with grey peas; and at all times as much oatmeal as could be eaten. Those were not the days of coffee, tea, or teetotalism, but of strong rum and arrack, which were regularly distributed; and whoever was so lucky as first to descry land from the masthead had his ration doubled. The instruments and methods used for determining the position at sea-the latitude and longitude-were of the most primitive and, one might say, ineffective kind. Cartography was in its infancy, and the few charts that were placed in the sailor's hands were projected on principles so regardless of the proportions of the sphere as to be absolutely misleading and dangerous. The simple device of the log for measuring the rate of sailing through the water was introduced but twenty years prior to Tasman's time. Before that it was usual to estimate the amount by guess. The sun's altitude, and the relative position of the heavenly bodies, which are now calculated with such accuracy by means of the sextant, and which, with the chronometer, give the true position, were then ascertained by very crude instruments-the astrolabe, and, later, the cross-staff; specimens of which I exhibit. The astrolabe was made of a circular piece of metal, 7in. in diameter, divided into quadrants, one of which was divided into degrees, and suspended freely, as one might suspend a watch by its ring. A broad pointer or index, 14in. wide, traversed the face of the instrument, and was divided through the exact middle of its length by a line termed "the line of confidence." Close to each extremity of the index, and perpendicular to it, a small plate was fixed, with two small holes, one larger than the other, but both being exactly over the line of confidence. These were

sights, and when the object viewed was seen in exact line through them-the sun or moon, or a star-the angle was read off. The cross-staff, which was probably used by Tasman, was a squared rod of wood, 3ft. in length, upon which were denoted angles or degrees, and having a sight at the eye-end. Upon this, by means of a slot, slid at right angles a second rod of wood, about 2ft. in length, having a sight at each terminal, and through these sights the object was viewed, the object-rod, if we may so call it, being adjusted upon the other, which was pointed plane to the horizon, and the angle read off. In this rough way was the sun's altitude taken, and probably a rough attempt was often made to take what

sailors call a lunar distance. An improvement was made on this cross-staff by adding one or two shorter transoms for reading smaller augles. On some of those odd frontispieces which embellish ancient atlases or geographies may be seen a sweet little cherub holding aloft an emblem of the cross apparently, but really this cross-staff. A hundred years after the introduction of the cross-staff came Dr. Hadley's quadrant (about 1731), which has developed into the perfect sextant of to-day. But with his tables of declinations, which were even then calculated, and this simple instrument, Tasman and his brethren succeeded in taking their latitudes with remarkable accuracy, as is evident by inspecting the coast-line of his Staten Land, which I have placed side by side with that of our New Zealand. But how he succeeded with his longitudes is quite a different matter. As we well know, longitudes can only be calculated perfectly by knowing the difference of time at two meridians, and this must be gained by the aid of accurate timekeepers. In Tasman's day, the very few clocks and watches in existence were but of little use in keeping the time. The problem of longitudes at sea was always considered of the utmost importance amongst maritime nations. Even at the beginning of this century it was thought that it would never be solved, owing to the difficulty or impossibility of ever constructing watches that would keep perfect time. As indicating this sentiment, the so-called Board of Longitude advertised, at the beginning of last century, in Queen Anne's reign, that they would give rewards of £10,000, £20,000, and £30,000 respectively to him who should discover a means of taking longitudes at sea to within sixty, forty, and thirty geographical miles. Precision within these limits was not thought of or expected. This liberal offer stimulated invention, and Dr. John Harrison, an ingenious mechanician, who for years devoted himself to making improvements in clocks and watches, succeeded in 1764 in gaining the prize of £20,000 with a watch--or chronometer, as we should now call it-which was twice carried on a voyage to the West Indies. The time kept was admirable, and insured an accuracy of longitude to within ten or twelve miles. One of Harrison's watches, which, by-the-by, cost from £80 to £100 apiece, was carried by Captain Cook on his first great voyage of discovery. Messrs. Wales and Bayly, who accompanied Cook's second expedition, state, in their astronomical observations of the voyage, published in 1777, that the longitude could then be computed to within the fifth or sixth of a degree that is, to ten or twelve geographical miles. The earliest account I can discover of the use of timekeepers at sea is in 1663, when two watches were used together on the same vessel. The result was not satisfactory, as may be