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PREFACE.
vii

accuracy. Without being less useful, we have connected, in our charts, the whole run of their ships, from the beginning of their discoveries to Batavia. The chart of the Magellanic Straits is of the same size, and upon the same scale as in the original, but more accurate; and the names by which the English call the several points of land, the bays and the reaches, are all added to the French names. The omission of the charts of Rio de la Plata, and of the Falkland Isles, is by no means an imperfection; because, very lately, two charts have been published in England, one equally good of the first, and a better one of the latter; it would therefore be needless to multiply the identical charts, or to give the public some imperfect ones.

Though Mr. de Bougainville is a man of undoubted veracity and abilities, he has, however, in a few instances, been misled by false reports, or prejudiced in favour of his nation: we have, in some additional notes, corrected as far as it was in our power these mistakes, and impartially vindicated the British nation, where we thought the author had been unjustly partial; for the love of one's country is, in our opinion, very consistent with common justice and good

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