Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/122

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
112
VOYAGE IN SEARCH
[1792.

away, and endeavour to ſave ſome of the remains of that unfortunate expedition.

This was the ſecond expedition which Captain Bligh had undertaken in queſt of the bread-fruit tree. In the courſe of the firſt voyage which he made for the purpoſe of procuring this valuable tree to the Weſt Indian ſettlements of the Engliſh, he had been ſet on ſhore in conſequence of a mutiny amongſt the crew, of which he publiſhed an account after his return to England.

We learnt that the Pandora Engliſh frigate, commanded by Captain Edwards, had ſince been at the Society Iſlands, where they had ſeized fourteen of the mutineers. Four of them afterwards made their eſcape when the veſſel was run aground off Norfolk Iſland. The ringleader of the mutineers, Chriſtian, who had been maſter of the veſſel under the command of Captain Bligh, had eſcaped with nine others to another iſland, and carried ſeveral of the natives with him. One of the officers of the Pandora lately arrived at the Cape, aſſured us that Bligh had behaved very ill to Chriſtian, and that an abuſe of authority on the ſide of the captain was the cauſe of all his ſubſequent misfortunes. Chriſtian, though maſter of the veſſel, had been maltreated, according to Captain Bligh's orders, as if he had

been