'The second volume is of the greatest importance, not only for its detailed chronicle of events but because of its narrative of voyages and expeditions of discovery ... The journals of Bass and Flinders are of particular importance since Bass's journal has never been recovered and ... the accounts of inland expeditions recorded in the journals of John Price and Henry Hacking are singularly interesting. Quite apart from the exploration interest of these journals, they provide the first report of the existence of the koala, the earliest recorded sighting of a wombat on mainland Australia and the first report of the discovery of the lyrebird, which is for the first time described and illustrated in colour' (Wantrup). The full title of this second volume is 'An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, from its First Settlement, in January 1788, to August 1801, with Remarks on the Dispositions, Customs, Manners, &c. of the Native Inhabitants of that Country. To which are added, some Particulars of New Zealand, compiled, by permission, from the MSS. of Lieutenant-Governor King; and an Account of a Voyage performed by Captain Flinders and Mr. Bass; by which the Existence of a Strait separating Van Dieman's Land from the Continent of New Holland was ascertained. Abstracted from the Journal of Mr. Bass'.