Page:Narrative of a Voyage around the World - 1843.djvu/11

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PREFACE.


Voyages undertaken for the express purposes of Maritime Discovery have always been received with so much favour by the British public, and especially when made (as in the present instance) by British officers, and under the direction of the British Government, that the writer of the present Narrative of a Voyage Round the World confidently trusts he will not be denied that indulgence which has been uniformly accorded to those who have preceded him. He hopes for such indulgence the rather that, although the practical results of his labours have been necessarily less fertile of novelty, and therefore of popular interest, than those of his more distinguished predecessors, they have not been less arduous or onerous to the individuals engaged in them.

In order that the scope and extent of the objects contemplated and attained, in this Voyage Round the World, may be judged of, it may be well to precede the narrative by a brief outline of its contents

Her Majesty's ship Sulphur was commissioned in September, 1835, by Captain Beechey, and, accompanied