Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
It was as well that this was so, for, at about the same time, the
governments in London and Paris became obsessed with sending
naval vessels on long voyages of discovery to the Great South Sea.
This was the age of the Enlightenment, when scientists, philosoph-
ers and political thinkers threw off old religious and philosophical
restraints, sought knowledge for its own sake and worked for the
perfection of human society. It would be pleasant to believe that the
various captains now sent to explore the uncharted regions of the
Pacific were despatched in the pure quest for truth The motives of
politicians are seldom so unalloyed:
We have reason to believe the French to be in a fair way of
getting . . . spices in their plantations, as Mr de Poivre has actually
planted at Isle de France some hundreds of clove and nutmeg-trees.
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Every true patriot will join in the wish, that our English East India
Company, prompted by a noble zeal for the improvement of natural
history, and every other useful branch of knowledge, might send a
set of men properly acquainted with mathematics, natural history,
physic, and other branches of literature, to their vast possessions
in the Indies, and every other place where their navigations extend,
and enable them to collect all kinds of useful and curious informa-
tions; to gather fossils, plants, seeds, and animals, peculiar to these
regions; to observe the manners, customs, learning, and religion of
the various nations of the East; to describe their agriculture, man-
ufactures, and commerce; to purchase Hebrew, Persian, Braminic
manuscripts, and such as are written in the various characters, dia-
lects, and languages of the different nations; to make observations
on the climate and constitution of the various countries; the heat
and moisture of the air, the salubrity and noxiousness of the place,
the remedies usual in the diseases of hot countries, and various oth-
er subjects. A plan of this nature, once set on foot in a judicious
manner, would not only do honour to the East India Company, but
