Mauritius, to refit his little craft, before venturing round the Cape of
Good Hope; and on the pretext that the passport he carried did not afford
safe conduct to the CUMBERLAND, having been made out for the
INVESTIGATOR, he was detained a prisoner in the Isle of France for over
six years.

The conduct of General de Caen in this matter has been severely commented
on, as it was entirely due to his personal pique and jealousy in the
affair that this indignity was put upon Flinders. The generous
hospitality extended by the British settlement to the French navigators
at Port Jackson found no response in this rough specimen of a soldier of
the revolution, who throughout the period of Flinders' detention, treated
him with studied rudeness and unnecessary harshness.

For three months Flinders was kept close prisoner as a spy, and for
twenty months as an ordinary prisoner of war. Still during his captivity
in the Isle of France, his thoughts were constantly busied with projects
for the further exploration of the great southern continent he had lately
left. In addition to the chafing weariness of prolonged detention and
enforced inactivity, he was constantly haunted by the dread that the
French would, after examination of his papers, step in and forestall him
in the matter. In a letter to Sir Joseph Banks, dated March 20th, 1806,
[See fac-simile of original letter (not included in this eBook)] he
mentions this fear, and adding, that disappointment and deferred hope of
release have in no way damped his ardour in the cause of science,
advances for consideration a scheme for exploring the interior of
Australia. Though now, after more than eighty years of discovery have
given us an intimate knowledge of the nature of the difficulties he would
have encountered, we may smile at the somewhat crude notions of the
daring navigator, we cannot refuse to recognise that a good deal of