France and Australia. The "prise de possession." A new chapter in our early history

When Ernest Scott, Professor of History in the University of Melbourne, was working on his Life of Flinders, he employed a copyist to obtain material from the Paris archives. The copyist found so much about Australia that the charges mounted very high. So Professor Scott pointed out to the Commonwealth Parliamentary Library and the Mitchell Library that they ought to have copies of these valuable historical documents. The authorities agreed, and the cost of Professor Scott's material was one-third of what it would otherwise have been.
This partial overhaul of the Paris archives by an intelligent copyist has thrown a flood of light on the early relations of France and Australia. An examination of the papers in the Commonwealth Library, made by the courtesy of the Speaker, reveals the hitherto unpublished fact that a French expedition did, in 1772, take formal possession of Western Australia. It is not in France alone that material may be found.
Hidden away in some dusty corner in Portugal, Spain, or possibly Holland, there may be documents which upset accepted ideas about the obscure but fascinating subject of early exploration in Australasian regions.