With the important 'Sur les decouvertes des Hollandais dans l'Australaisie', found between pages 437* and 450* towards the end of Volume I.

"An extremely important and thorough collection of voyages, and one of the outstanding works relating to the early history of Australasia" (Hill). It contains an account of all voyages to the south, beginning with the second Vespucci expedition of 1502, and going up to 1747, including the voyages of Magellan, Drake, Quiros, Schouten, Le Maire, Tasman and others.

De Brosses profoundly influenced Bougainvile, and sought to encourage French discovery in the South Seas, and also argued for programmatic colonisation. He suggest France should colonise Australia.

De Brosses's text was later used by John Callander as the (unacknowledged) basis for his influential 'Terra Australis Incognita' (1766-1768) in which form it had much to do with British plans for colonial expansion by transportation.