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 By Andrew G. Smallacombe (Guru).

                   __The Non-Discovery of Australia__



     Although Australia is the largest island on earth and contributes a
continental land mass in its entity, it remained undiscovered for a considerable
length of time. This paper deals with those who did not discover Australia, why,
and the implications of their non-discoveries.
     The Australian Aborigines were the first people to not discover Australia.
There are a number of theories put forward by a number of leading experts as to
why this is so. It is generally accepted that the Aborigines failed to discover
Australia because they had:-
                             -no guns
                             -no Bibles
                             -no diseases such as the plague, small pox, etc.
                             -no flags
                             -no title deeds
                             -no monarch
     Furthermore, current theory is that they may have crossed over from
Southeast Asia by a number of land bridges caused by the Ice Age, which would
have been cheating, since all discovery had to be done by boat. In addition, the
Aborigines are not of European descent, and it is universally accepted that
discovery can only be an act of white races.(1) At any rate, this all took place
long before the Age of Discovery and therefore can and should be discounted.
Therefore Australia remains undiscovered.
     The next group of people not to discover Australia were the Dutch, which is
somewhat surprising considering the number of times they ran into it on their way
to subjugating Java and laying the foundations of apartheid in South Africa. In

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(1) Other examples include China (discovered by Marco Polo, not the Chinese) and
the Americas (discovered by Colombus, not the Indians)

                              1.
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hindsight, however, this may be rather fortunate(2) since otherwise we would all
be Reformed and speaking Dutch. This is why Australia is known as "the Lucky
Country".
     The Third people not to discover Australia were the Spanish (or Spaniards,
as they are sometimes called). The Spanish (or Spaniards) sailed throughout the
Pacific Ocean(3), naming almost everywhere they discovered after their saints and
conquering South America and the Philippines. Incredibly, by the time they 
discovered Vanu Atu(4) they had run out of saints. Naming the largest island
Espiritus Santo, they returned home to obtain the latest list. Again, this proved
fortunate since Australia would have been the next destination, and we might all
be Roman Catholic, had the Inquisition, and speak Spanish (or Portuguese, as the
Brazilians call it.)
     The French (ba^tards!) also did not discover Australia. They sailed around
the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans, carving up an empire in and enslaving
the people of Africa, the Middle East, India and Indochina into colonies, thus
promoting liberty and equality. This was done to prove French superiority to the
nations of the world, despite the fact they couldn't even win a war against
England. That they failed to discover Australia meant that we have been (largely)
free of quiche, atom bombs and /Chiraq/.(5)
     The English were the last people to not discover Australia, in spite of the
huge number of fleets sent out to discover it. That so many commissioned explorers
somehow managed to miss a land mass of such magnitude may help explain England's
demise in the arena of international cricket. England then colonized Australia,

__________________________
(2) Those who doubt the validity of this statement usually change their opinions
when their attention is directed to Anita Keating.
(3) This was named by the Spanish (or Spaniard) explorer Magellan, who originally
intended to name it The Ocean. He was allegedly requested by his first officer to
name it more specifically, upon which he renamed it The Specific Ocean.
(4) Vanu Atu was not discovered by the Melanesians. See above for reasonsq.
(5) Chirac (pron. Shi-rack) Fr.= military disaster.

                              2.
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sending out fleets of settlers. Traditionally, it was thought that most of the
early settlers were undesirable elements of English society, but recent research
suggests otherwise.(6)
     Finally, Australia was not discovered by Indonesian fishermen, seafaring
Chinese of the Ming Dynasty, or Japanese tourists. These people are known to
history as Et Cetera.










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(6) This would explain the presence of whinging poms, soccer hooligans, cockneys,
and Take That in England, and their absence in Australia.

                              3.
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This document was typed in verbatim from the original by Bruce Alcorn, with
permission from the author. Comments, etc can be sent to
alcorn@cs.flinders.edu.au to be passed on to the author.

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