Narrative and Successful Result of a Voyage in the South Seas performed by Order of the Government of British India to ascertain the actual fate of La Perouse's Expedition interspersed with Accounts of the Religion

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Manners Customs and Cannibal Practices of the South Sea Islanders. 2 vols. London: Hurst Chance and Co. 1829. (Facs. reprint Amsterdam 1972). 8vo. Orig. cloth. With 2 folding engraved frontispieces one of which is coloured a folding map coloured in outline a full-page plate and 1 text-illust. Errata-page opp. p. lxxviii in Vol. I. (Bibliotheca Australiana Nos. 53-54). NOTE: This voyage finally solved the mystery of the loss of La Perouse and his Expedition. Forty years after the disappearance of La Perouse Peter Dillon a sandalwood trader called at the Solomons and when a silver sword guard was brought out suspected he had stumbled on the solution. He returned to India persuaded the government of Bengal to sponsor an expedition and sailed to the Solomons via Tasmania New Zealand and Tonga. At Vanikoro he conducted a careful investigation among the natives regarding the shipwrecks and was able to obtain many relics including a portion of the stern of the Boussole ships' bells stamped 'Bazin m' a fait' monogrammed silver metal fragments and mill stones known to have been aboard. One native (depicted on a folding plate) had a glass piece from a thermometer in his nose. On the successful receipt of his report and this material in France Dillon was made a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour his expenses were defrayed and he was granted a pension. Dillon described as 'eccentric quick of temper and with a vivid vocabulary' (Dunmore) includes a scathing examination of the legal system of Tasmania and New South Wales. Aboard the ship had been a Dr. Robert Tytler with whom relations were so strained that Dillon was accused of insanity and the doctor in turn arrested for attempts to incite mutiny; and upon arrival in Hobartown assault charges were placed against Dillon and the ship sequestered. Over 40 pages relate to the questionable legal proceedings between judge and governor and the appendix reprints articles from Australian and Indian sources on Dillon's treatment in what he called a 'land of corruption and injustice'.