1803.
July.
senger in the Porpoise; in order to lay my charts and journals before the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, and obtain, if such should be their pleasure, another ship to complete the examination of Terra Australis. The last service I could render to the colony with the Investigator and my people, was to lay down an additional pair of moorings in Sydney Cove; and that done, we left the ship as a storehouse hulk on the 31st, and prepared for our voyage to England.
The Porpoise was commanded by Mr. William Scott, a senior master in the navy; but he and the greater part of his people having expressed a wish to be discharged, it was complied with; and the command was given to Mr. Fowler, first lieutenant of the Investigator, and another crew of thirty-eight men selected from the ship's company. In disposing of the other officers and people their several inclinations were consulted. The surgeon took his passage in the Bridgewater to India, the gunner remained charged with the care of the Investigator's stores, and Mr. Evans, master's mate, was left sick at the hospital; Messrs. Brown, Bauer, and Allen stayed at Port Jackson to prosecute their researches in natural history, until my arrival with another ship, or until eighteen months should expire without their having received intimation that the voyage was to be continued; nine men were discharged at their own request, and the twenty-two remaining officers and men, including myself, embarked in the Porpoise as passengers.
Of the nine convicts who had been received into the Investigator, one had died; another had behaved himself so improperly, that I could not recommend him to the governor; and the remaining seven were fully emancipated by His Excellency from their sentence of transportation, their conduct having been such throughout, as to receive my approbation. Four of these were entered into the complement of the Porpoise; but I am sorry to add, that the subsequent behaviour of two was different to what it had been when their liberty was at stake, and that a third was condemned to the hulks not very long after he reached England.
