A landmark in both the history of the Uranie voyage but also the broader development of the scientific planning of the entire grands voyages project.

A landmark in both the history of the Uranie voyage but also the broader development of the scientific planning of the entire grands voyages project.

This is a remarkable, astonishingly complete, listing of the scientific aims of the expedition and the measures to be taken to fulfil them, signed by the four main officers Freycinet had hand-chosen for their roles. Not only does it provide an insight into the entire planning of the voyage, but is replete with the signatures of all four, two of whom were soon to die at sea. Carefully written out by Freycinet's clerk Gabert, in his neat formal hand, it is evidently the result of numerous earlier drafts and revisions.

Prepared on board the Uranie, these detailed instructions were given to his major scientific officers when they were in Tenerife (they had left Toulon, with Rose secretly on board, a month previously). Tenerife was their departure point for the voyage proper, with the real business of the expedition about to get under way, so it is interesting to see Freycinet formalising things at this key juncture: no doubt he had thoughts of leaving behind anyone who dared to appear reluctant or disengaged. Five days later, with this document safely stowed with his private papers, they weighed anchor and sailed for the southern hemisphere.

While the document amply testifies to Freycinet's quite extraordinary, indeed obsessive attention to detail, it also goes a long way to explaining both the reasons for and the success of the expedition. Few documents could convey so completely the real character of Freycinet, ambitious to bring glory to every part of his voyaging.

A scientist in his own right, Freycinet is known to have canvassed most of the key figures in Paris before he sailed, perhaps most notably François Arago and Baron Cuvier. Much like Captain Cook on his third voyage, one of the reasons why he preferred that the science be carried out by career sailors was that he could command them: having sailed as a junior officer with Baudin, he was well aware of the effects that civilian dissent could have on board a voyage of exploration. His science was all to be done by naval officers.

In this context, these instructions, issued once he was at last well clear of France, represent Freycinet's own considered synthesis of all the scientific ambitions and requirements of his voyage, all the advice that he had received before departure, and all the many areas in which he hoped to make scientific advances and progress.

The document is signed by Freycinet with his elaborate formal signature, and further signed by the four officers to whom it is addressed: his Second-in-command Jérôme Frédéric Perrette Lamarche (a veteran of the War who had a long career in the French Navy); second lieutenant J.J. Labiche (who would die at sea two years into the voyage); ensign Clair Léonard Théodore Laborde (who would also die at sea, in the first few months of the expedition); and ensign Louis Isidore Duperrey, who would rise to high rank, taking command of his own expedition, in the Coquille, a few years later.

This extraordinary survival was retained, until modern times, in the Freycinet family archives at Laage. It can be compared with what is surely a draft version, less finished and unsigned, in the papers of the Archives Nationales.