Second voyage in the Resolution. was afloat again; this time to investigate the then unsolved problem of a great southern continent, which had been only in part set at rest by the discoveries of Byron, and by the circumnavigation of New Zealand. In this voyage he took the command of the Resolution, of four hundred and sixty-two tons, while Captain Furneaux took charge of the Adventure, of three hundred and thirty-six tons. Both, like the old Endeavour, were Whitby vessels; and Cook has himself recorded that every possible attention was paid to their proper equipment, and to the due supply of anti-scorbutics, and of other necessaries, under the especial eye of Lord Sandwich, then at the head of the Admiralty. The ships left Plymouth on July 13th, 1772, and, after calling at the Cape, pushed at once to the south, till on January 17th, 1773, they reached 67° 15´ S., where farther progress in that direction was barred by fields of solid ice. Thence Cook made his way to New Zealand, where he arrived, in Dusky Bay, March 25th, after having been one hundred and seventeen days at sea, and having traversed three thousand six hundred and sixty leagues. His companion, Captain Furneaux, who had been for some time separated from him, by asserting that the sea at the south end of New South Wales was only a deep bay, missed the opportunity of tracing the Straits of Van Diemen's Land, while he at the same time misled Captain Cook.
At New Zealand Cook landed several domestic animals, and the seeds of various vegetables, both of which have prospered remarkably. From that island he paid a second visit to his former friends in Otaheite, and, having surveyed several islands, among others
