May 25, 1857.] ADMIRALTY SURVEYS— SCOTLAND. 401 



tensive dredging of all the upper part of the river so soon as the 

 Thames Conservancy Board can be brought into action. 



On the East Coast of England, Mr. E. K. Calver has revised all the 

 charts during the past year, and inserted the changes that have taken 

 place during the last ten years, and especially in the frequented 

 anchorages of Yarmouth and Lowestoft Eoads. He has also pre- 

 pared the Sailing Directions for this coast and for the opposite shore 

 of Belgium, Holland, and Jutland up to the Skaw, which will form 

 Parts III. and IV. of the ' Korth Sea Pilot ' now in preparation. 



On the South Coast of England, the surveying party under Com- 

 mander Cox and Messrs. Usborne and Davis have just completed a 

 careful examination of Plymouth Sound, whence it appears that that 

 well-known roadstead has not silted up in any appreciable degree 

 since the breakwater was placed across its entrance — an interval of 

 five and forty years — the first stone having been deposited in 

 August, 1812. 



In Cornwall, Captain Williams and Mr. ^^'ells have completed the 

 survey of the Fowey River, from Lostwithiel to the sea, and a portion 

 of the coast from Fowey to the Dodman. 



In the Bristol Channel, Commander Aldridge and Mr. Hall have 

 surveyed Caldy and Tenby Eoads, where they have discovered and 

 mapped several new rocks and shoals not before pointed out. 



Scotland. — In the Frith of Forth, Lieut. Thomas and Mr. Sutton 

 have surveyed the coast of Haddington by Dunbar and St. Abb's 

 Head to Coldingham, and have completed the outer soundings to the 

 eastward of the Isle of May, which mark the approach to this ex- 

 tensive estuary. 



Farther north, a detailed plan of the Bay and Harbour of Wick 

 and Pulteney Town has recently been published at the Admiralty, 

 preparatory, we trust, to the laying out of a Harbour of Eefuge on 

 that exposed coast, where in an easterly gale the 1000 herring-boats 

 that annually fish out of AVick have no shelter to run for. The 

 numbers of valuable lives at stake in these important fisheries im- 

 peratively demand that a suitable harbour in the most appropriate 

 spot should be constructed without further loss of time.* 



The Sailiug Directions for the Orkneys and Shetland, originally 

 drawn up by the late Commander Thomas, and revised and corrected 

 by Mr. E. K. Calver, have been published during the past year, and 



* A subject of considerable importance to physical geographers as connected 

 with the harbour of Wick will presently be discussed {sec Physical Geography). 



