t at Port Jackson, it resisted the
opening of direct trade between Great Britain and New South Wales, with
as jealous a dislike as ever the Spanish monopolists at Seville displayed
in the sixteenth century concerning all trade with America that did not
flow through their hands. Even so recently as 1806 the Company
opposed--and, strangely enough, successfully--the sale of a cargo of
sealskins and whale oil from Sydney, on the ground "that the charter of
the colony gave the colonists no right to trade, and that the transaction
was a violation of Company's charter and against its welfare." The grant
to Flinders was not, therefore, a manifestation of zeal for Australian
development, except in the matter of finding harbours, and except, also,
that there was an uneasy feeling that the French would be mischievously
busy on the north coast. "I hope the French ships of discovery will not
station themselves on the north-west coast of Australia," wrote C.F.
Greville, one of the Company's directors.

The instructions furnished to Flinders prescribed the course of the
voyage very strictly. They were that he should first run down the coast
from 130 degrees of east longitude (that is, from about the head of the
Great Australian Bight) to Bass Strait, and endeavour to discover such
harbours as there might be. Then, proceeding through the Strait, he was
to call at Sydney to refresh his company and refit the ship. After that
he was to return along the coast and diligently examine it as far as King
George's Sound. As the sailing was delayed till the middle of July,
Flinders expressed a wish that he should not be ordered to return to the
south coast from Port Jackson. "If my orders do not forbid it, I shall
examine the south coast more minutely in my first run along it, and if
anything material should present itself, as a strait, gulf, or very large
river, shall take as much time in its examination as the remaining part
of the summer shall then consist of; for I consider it very material to
the success of the voyage and to its early completion that we should be
upon the northern coasts in winter and the southern ones in summer."

This was written to Banks, who, as we have seen, could probably have
secured an alteration of the official instructions had he desired to do
so. But they were not modified; and about a fortnight later (July 17)
Flinders wrote: "The Admiralty have not thought good to permit me to
circumnavigate New Holland in the w