A Short History of Australia by Ernest Scott

Attempts to cross the Blue Mountains--Blaxland's success--Evans discovers the Bathurst Plains--Voyages of Bass and Flinders in the TOM THUMB--Bass discovers coal--Discovery of Bass Strait and Westernport--Bass and Flinders circumnavigate Tasmania in the NORFOLK--End of Bass--Voyage of the LADY NELSON--Murray discovers Port Phillip-- Flinders's voyage in the INVESTIGATOR--Discovery of Spencer's and St. Vincent's Gulfs and Kangaroo Island--Meeting with Baudin in Encounter Bay--Circumnavigation of Australia--The name Australia--Flinders in Mauritius--His liberation and death.

The settlement at Port Jackson, together with its extensions at Parramatta and on the Hawkesbury River, occupied an area which, compared with the total bulk of Australia, was but an insignificant fragment. It was not so large as is the island of Corsica in comparison with the size of Europe. What the continent was like, even in outline, was not known until fifteen years after the First Fleet arrived. That it was a continent at all, and not a cluster of islands, was not known. That Van Diemen's Land was isolated was not known. What the inland territory was like was not known. There was an immense field of labour for explorers to cover, both by sea and land.