A Voyage to Terra Australis — Volume 2: Undertaken for the purpose of completing the discovery of that vast country, and prosecuted in the years 1801, 1802 and 1803, in His Majesty's ship the Investigator, and subsequently in the armed vessel Porpoise and Cumberland schoonerFlinders, Matthew
History
A Voyage to Terra Australis — Volume 2: Undertaken for the purpose of completing the discovery of that vast country, and prosecuted in the years 1801, 1802 and 1803, in His Majesty's ship the Investigator, and subsequently in the armed vessel Porpoise and Cumberland schooner
Flinders, Matthew
Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Voyages and travels
Sir Edward Pellew's Group, as will be seen by a reference to the plan,
affords numerous anchorages against both the south-east and north-west
monsoon; but unless it should be within the two small isles near the
south-west side of Vanderlin's Island, where the depth was not well
ascertained, there is not a single harbour, the different bays and coves
being too shallow to admit a ship. Wood for fuel is easy to be procured;
and water may be had in December, and probably as late as April or May,
but I think not afterwards. The most accessible watering place we could
find, was at the back of the mangroves near our principal anchorage,
within the east point of North Island, where, with some trouble, our
casks were filled; and at a beach there, left dry at low water, the seine
was hauled with some success. At Vanderlin's Island there are many
beaches fit for the seine; and indeed it seemed superior to the other
islands as well for this, as for every other purpose, when a ship can lie
there; it is also the most frequented by the Indians, and may probably
have fixed inhabitants.
The _latitude_ of Observation Island, from two meridian altitudes to the
north and south, is 15° 36' 46" S.
_Longitude_ from six sets of distances of the sun east of the moon, given
in Table IV. of Appendix No. 1, 137° 6' 42"; but by the time keeper No.
543 corrected, it is preferably 137° 3' 15" E.
The rates of the time keepers were found from afternoon's altitudes in an
artificial horizon, between the 16th and 26th; and the means, with their
errors from mean Greenwich time, at noon there on the last day of
observation, were as under:
Earnshaw's No. 543, slow 2h 29' 11.17" and losing 14.93" per day
Earnshaw's No. 520, slow 4h 11' 37.59" and losing 28.25" per day
This rate of No. 543 is only 0.19" more than that found at Sweers'
Island, and so far as the six sets of lunars may be relied on, the
longitude by this time keeper was not far from the truth; the letting
down on the passage therefore did not seem to have produced any
change; but in No. 520, the rate is more than 8" greater, and the
longitude was getting 1½' per day too much to the east, as well before as
after it was let down. The coast from Sweers' to Observation Island is
consequently laid down by No. 543, with the small accelerating correction
arising from the 0.19" increase of rate in 16.4 days.
_Variation_ of the theodolite, observed on the east side of South-west
Island, 2° 22' east.
In the bearings taken at different parts within the group, the variation
seemed to differ from 2° 30' to l° 30'. The largest variations were on
the east sides of the islands, and the smallest on the west sides;
seeming to show an attraction of the land upon the south end of the
needle. On board the ship, when coasting along the east side of
Vanderlin's Island, and the whole group lay to the west, the variation
appeared from the bearings to be as much as 4° east.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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