person on board when the ship sailed from Plymouth.

The draught of the ship was 13 feet 6 inches, and her provisions were
calculated to last eighteen months. The original intention had been that
the transit of Venus should be observed at the Marquesas; but the
Dolphin's return before Cook sailed, with the news of the discovery of
Tahiti and its friendly inhabitants, caused this island to be finally
selected.

The exact text of Cook's orders cannot be given. They were secret orders;
but, curiously enough, while the covering letter, which enjoined him to
show them to nobody, which is dated July 30th, 1768, is duly entered in
Admiralty Records, the orders themselves, which should follow in the
letter book, are omitted. They have never been published. Nevertheless,
we can gather what they were.

Cook, in the published account of his Second Voyage, says he had
instructions to proceed directly to Tahiti, and afterwards to prosecute
the design of making discoveries in the Pacific by proceeding southward
to the latitude of 40 degrees, and if he did not find land to continue
his voyage to the west till he fell in with New Zealand, which he was
directed to explore, and thence to return to England by such route as he
should judge most convenient.

Precautions against the terrible scourge, scurvy, had not been forgotten.

Besides the supply of all anti-scorbutics then known, a special letter
was written to Cook directing him to take a quantity of malt to sea, for
the purpose of being made into wort, as a cure for scorbutic disorders,
as recommended by Dr. McBride.