History of a Voyage to the Falkland Islands

one finds woods and fresh water in abundance, and whose principal port is vast enough to contain a thousand vessels (e); an Island which the best Navigators are tempted to rank alongside Plato's Atlantic Island The mythical lost continent of Atlantis. and the beautiful country of El Dorado The legendary "City of Gold" sought by explorers in South America..

Woods Rogers, at the very beginning of this century, commanded a small squadron charged with reconnoitering the South Sea; he had as second Captain the celebrated Physician Dower, and as Pilot William Dampier, who had already immortalized himself by two voyages around the world; Rogers ran along the Northwest coast of the Malouines Islands The Falkland Islands. and determined their position; but he judged their extent poorly (f).

(e) This Pepys Island, according to Admiral Anson, is at forty-seven degrees South latitude; and, according to Doctor Halley, eighty leagues from Cape Blanco on the Coast of the Patagonians. Captain Cowley named it Pepys Island in honor of Samuel Pepys, Secretary to the Duke of York, who was later James II, and who at that time was Great Admiral of England. Commodore Byron, in his voyage around the World; and Mr. de Bougainville, in two voyages to the Malouines Islands, have vainly sought this Pepys Island, which was probably, for Captain Cowley, nothing but a cloud or a large ice bank.

(f) According to the account of Admiral Anson, "Rogers ran the Northeast Coast of these Islands in 1708; he saw that they extended about the length of two degrees, that they were composed of heights which sloped gently one before the other; that the terrain was good and covered with wood; and that, according to appearances, there was no lack of good ports."

Dom Pernety Antoine-Joseph Pernety (1716–1796), a Benedictine monk and naturalist who accompanied Bougainville. here corrects Captain Rogers. "If this Englishman," he says, "only ran the Northeast Coast of the Malouines Islands, how can he know if these Islands only extend..."