Intellectually, and as a navigator, Laperouse was a son of James Cook,
and he himself would have rejoiced to be so described. The allusions to
his predecessor in his writings are to be numbered by scores, and the
note of reverent admiration is frequently sounded. He followed Cook's
guidance in the management of his ships, paying particular attention to
the diet of his crews. He did not succeed in keeping scurvy at bay
altogether, but when the disease made its appearance he met it promptly
by securing fresh vegetable food for the sufferers, and was so far
successful that when he arrived in Botany Bay his whole company was in
good health.
The influence of the example and experience of Cook may be illustrated
in many ways, some of them curious. We may take a point as to which he
really had little to fear; but he knew what had occurred in Cook's case
and he was anxious that the same should not happen to him. The
published story of Cook's first South Sea Voyage, as is well known, was
not his own. His journal was handed over to Dr. Hawkesworth, a
gentleman who tried to model his literary style on that of Dr. Johnson,
and evolved a pompous, big-drum product in consequence.
Hawkesworth garnished the manly, straightforward navigator's simple and
direct English with embellishments of his own. Where Cook was plain
Hawkesworth was ornate; where Cook was sensible Hawkesworth was silly;
where Cook was accurate, Hawkesworth by stuffing in his own precious
observations made the narrative unreliable, and even ridiculous. In
fact, the gingerbread Johnson simply spoiled Cook.
Dr. Johnson was by no means gratified by the ponderous prancings of his
imitator. We learn from Boswell that when the great man met Captain
Cook at a dinner given by the President of the Royal Society, he said
that he "was much pleased with the conscientious accuracy of that
celebrated circumnavigator, who set me right as to many of the
exaggerated accounts given by Dr. Hawkesworth of his voyages." Cook
himself was annoyed by the decorating of his story, and resented the
treatment strongly.
Laperouse knew this, and was very anxious that nobody in France should
Hawkesworthify him. He did not object to being carefully edited, but he
did not want to be decorated. He wrote excellent French narrative
prose, and his work may be read with delight. Its qualities of clarity,
picturesqueness and smoothness, are quite in accord with the fine
traditions of the language. But, as it was likely that part of the
history of his voyage might be published before his return, he did not
want it to be handed over to anybody who would trick it out in
finery, and he therefore wrote the following letter:
"If my journal be published before my return, let the editing of it by
no means be entrusted to a man of letters; for either he will sacrifice
to the turn of a phrase the proper terms which the seaman and man of
learning would prefer, but which to him will appear harsh and
barbarous; or, rejecting all the nautical and astronomical details, and
endeavouring to make a pleasing romance, he will for want of the
knowledge his education has not allowed him to acquire, commit mistakes
which may prove fatal to those who shall follow me.
