as first Lords Commissioners of the
Admiralty,
successively honoured the Investigator's voyage
with their patronage,
this account of it is respectfully dedicated,
by Their Lordships
most obliged, and
most obedient
humble servant
Matthew Flinders


35. PAGE FROM MANUSCRIPT OF FLINDERS' ABRIDGED NARRATIVE (UNPUBLISHED).

(Melbourne Public Library.)

from the general's conduct, that he has sought to impose upon him, and
this for the purpose, perhaps for the pleasure, of prolonging to the
utmost my unjust detention.

But if apprehensions for the safety of this land are not the cause of the
order of the French government remaining unexecuted, what reason can
there be, sufficiently strong to have induced the captain-general to
incur the risk of misobedience, first to the passport, and afterwards to
the order for my liberation. This I shall endeavour to explain in the
following and last chapter of this discussion; promising, however, that
what I shall have to offer upon this part of the subject, can only be
what a consideration of the captain-general's conduct has furnished me,
as being the most probable. I am not conscious of having omitted any
material circumstance, either here or in the narration, or of having