23rd January, 1827, accompanied by a French agent.

The Recherche, after touching at several points in the Pacific,
cast anchor before Vanikoro, 7th July, 1827, in that same harbour
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 18 lb.
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 towards New Zealand;
put into Calcutta, 7th April, 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' S. lat., and 156@ 30' E. long., 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 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 harbour of Vanou.

On the 23rd, several officers went round the island and brought
back some unimportant trifles. The natives, adopting a system
of denials and evasions, refused to take them to the unlucky place.
This ambiguous conduct led them to believe that the natives had
ill-treated the castaways, and indeed they seemed to fear that Dumont
d'Urville had come to avenge La Perouse and his unfortunate crew.

However, on the 26th, appeased by some presents, and understanding that they
had no reprisals to fear, they led M. Jacquireot to the scene of the wreck.

There, in three or four fathoms of water, between the reefs
of Pacou and Vanou, lay anchors, cannons, pigs of lead and iron,
embedded in the limy concretions. The large boat and the whaler
belonging to the Astrolabe were sent to this place, and, not without
some difficulty, their crews hauled up an anchor weighing 1,800
lbs., a brass gun, some pigs of iron, and two copper swivel-guns.

Dumont d'Urville, questioning the natives, learned too that La Perouse,
after losing both his vessels on the reefs of this island,
had constructed a smaller boat, only to be lost a second time.
Where, no one knew.

But the French Government, fearing that Dumont d'Urville was
not acquainted with Dillon's movements, had sent the sloop
Bayonnaise, commanded by Legoarant de Tromelin, to Vanikoro,
which had been stationed on the west coast of America.
The Bayonnaise cast her anchor before Vanikoro some months
after the departure of the Astrolabe, but found no new document;
but stated that the savages had respected the monument to La Perouse.
That is the substance of what I told Captain Nemo.

"So," he said, "no one knows now where the third vessel perished
that was constructed by the castaways on the island of Vanikoro?"

"No one knows."

Captain Nemo said nothing, but signed to me to follow him into
the large saloon. The Nautilus sank several yards below the waves,
and the panels were opened.

I hastened to the aperture, and under the crustations of coral,
covered with fungi, syphonules, alcyons, madrepores, through myriads
of charming fish--girelles, glyphisidri, pompherides, diacopes, and
holocentres--I recognised certain debris that the drags had not been
able to tear up--iron stirrups, anchors, cannons, bullets, capstan
fittings, the stem of a ship, all objects clearly proving the wreck
of some vessel, and now carpeted with living flowers. While I was
looking on this desolate scene, Captain Nemo said, in a sad voice:

"Commander La Perouse set out 7th December, 1785, with his vessels
La Boussole and the Astrolabe. He first cast anchor at Botany Bay,
visited the Friendly Isles, New Caledonia, then directed his course
towards Santa Cruz, and put into Namouka, one of the Hapai group.
Then his vessels struck on the unknown reefs of Vanikoro.
The Boussole, which went first, ran aground on the southerly coast.
The Astrolabe went to its help, and ran aground too. The first vessel
was destroyed almost immediately. The second, stranded under the wind,
resisted some days. The natives made the castaways welcome.
They installed themselves in the island, and constructed a smaller boat
with the debris of the two large ones. Some sailors stayed willingly
at Vanikoro; the others, weak and ill, set out with La Perouse.
They directed their course towards the Solomon Islands, and there perished,
with everything, on the westerly coast of the chief island of the group,


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