Читать книгу Australian History For Dummies - Alex McDermott - Страница 44

By 1763 the British had gained supremacy of the world’s oceans, except for one final frontier (bom, bom, boom): The Pacific Ocean.

Ideas about a great southern land mass in the Pacific Ocean had been circulating for millennia. In ancient times, Ptolemy had surmised that some big land mass had to be down there to counterbalance Europe and Asia, and stop the planet going all topsy-turvy and flipping over. Throughout the 17th century, more solid evidence started emerging, largely thanks to reports from the mostly Dutch explorers in the region. (Refer to Chapter 2 for more on these explorers and traders.) It was time for Britain to make its mark.

For this daring task, two men were chosen: James Cook and Joseph Banks. Between them, they managed to chart the east coast of Australia, and have some lovely fun documenting all the weird and wonderful new flora and fauna they encountered along the way.