Just then Captain Nemo asked me what I knew about the wreck of La Perouse.
“Only what everyone knows, captain,” I replied.
“And could you tell me what everyone knows about it?” he inquired ironically.
“Easily.”
I related to him all that the last works of Dumont d’Urville had made known—works from which the following is a brief account.
La Perouse, and his second, Captain de Langle, were sent by Louis XVI, in 1785, on a voyage of circumnavigation. They embarked in the corvettes the Boussole and the Astrolabe, neither of which were again heard of. In 1791 the French government, justly uneasy as to the fate of these two sloops, manned two large merchantmen, the Récherché and the Esperance, which left Brest the 28th of September, under the command of Bruni d’Entrecasteaux.
Two months after, they learned from Bowen, commander of the Albemarle, that the debris of shipwrecked vessels had been seen on the coasts of New Georgia. But D’Entrecasteaux, ignoring this communication—rather uncertain besides—directed his course toward the Admiralty Isles, mentioned in a report of Captain Hunter’s as being the place where La Perouse was wrecked.
They sought in vain. The Esperance and the Récherché passed before Vanikoro without stopping there, and in fact this voyage was most disastrous, as it cost D’Entrecasteaux his life, and those of two of his lieutenants, besides several of his crew.
Captain Dillon, a shrewd old Pacific sailor, was the first to find unmistakable traces of the wrecks. On the 15th of May, 1824, his vessel, the St. Patrick, passed close to Tikopia, one of the New Hebrides. There a Lascar came alongside in a canoe, sold him the handle of a sword in silver, that bore the print of characters engraved on the hilt. The Lascar pretended that six years before, during a stay at Vanikoro, he had seen two Europeans that belonged to some vessels that had run aground on the reefs some years ago.
Dillon guessed that he meant La Perouse, whose disappearance had troubled the whole world. He tried to get on to Vanikoro, where according to the Lascar he would find numerous debris of the wreck, but winds and tide prevented him.
Dillon returned to Calcutta. There he interested the Asiatic Society and the Indian Company in his discovery. A vessel, to which was given the name of the Récherché, was put at his disposal, and he set out, January 23, 1827, accompanied by a French agent.
The Récherché, after touching at several points in the Pacific, cast anchor before Vanikoro, July 7, 1827, in this same harbor of Vanou where the Nautilus was at this time.
There it collected numerous relics of the wreck—iron utensils, anchors, pulley-strops, swivel-guns, an eighteen-pound shot, fragments of astronomical instruments, a piece of crown-work, and a bronze clock, bearing this inscription: “Bazin m’a fait,” the mark of the foundry of the arsenal at Brest about 1785. There could be no further doubt.
Dillon, having made all inquiries, stayed in the unlucky place till October. Then he quitted Vanikoro, and directed his course toward New Zealand; put into Calcutta, April 7, 1828, and returned to France, where he was warmly welcomed by Charles X.
But at the same time, without knowing Dillon’s movements, Dumont d’Urville had already set out to find the scene of the wreck. And they had learned from a whaler that some medals and a cross of St. Louis had been found in the hands of some savages of Louisiade and New Caledonia. Dumont d’Urville, commander of the Astrolabe, had then sailed, and two months after Dillon had left Vanikoro, he put into Hobart Town. There he learned the results of Dillon’s inquiries, and found that a certain James Hobbs, second lieutenant of the Union, of Calcutta, after landing on an island situated 8° 18′ south latitude, and 156° 30′ east longitude, had seen some iron bars and red stuffs used by the natives of these parts. Dumont d’Urville, much perplexed, and not knowing how to credit the reports of low-class journals, decided to follow Dillon’s track.
On the 10th of February, 1828, the Astrolabe appeared off Tikopia, and D’Urville took as guide and interpreter a deserter found on the island; made his way to Vanikoro, sighted it on the 12th inst., lay among the reefs until the 14th, and not until the 20th did he cast anchor within the barrier in the harbor of Vanou.