136 VOYAGE TO THE 



the channel there is not more tlian ten feet and a half 

 at low water spring tides ; the rise of the tide at this 

 time being seven feet one inch. The channel has 

 shifted since the surveys of Captains King and Hey- 

 wood, and new land-marks for entering, which I have 

 given in my Nautical Remarks, are become necessary. 



On leaving Macao we hoped that the S. W. mon- 

 soon would set in, and carry us expeditiously to the 

 northward ; instead of this, however, we were driven 

 down upon the island of Leuconia in the parallel of 

 17* 16' N. where we perceived the coast at a great 

 distance. Here it fell calm, and the weather, which 

 had been increasing in temperature since our departure 

 from Macao, became oppressively hot, the thermo- 

 meter sometimes standing at 89° in the shade, and the 

 mean height for the day being 85°,7 of Fahrenheit. 



About this time we saw several splendid meteors, 

 which left trains of sparks as they descended On the 

 6th a parhelion was visible at 21" 50' on the south 

 side of the sun, when about 2' of altitude, and as we 

 passed Orange Island we felt a sudden shock, accom- 

 panied by a momentary gust of wind which threatened 

 the masts : the sky at this time was quite clear and 

 cloudless. 



On the 7th we saw the south Bashee Islands, cele- 

 brated as one of the resorts of the Buccaneers, and 

 the day following made the Island of Botel Tobago 

 Xima. While off the Bashee Islands we noticed a 

 great rippling in the Balingtang Channel, and during 

 the night we experienced so strong a current to the 

 north west that instead of passing the Cumbrian Reef 

 ten miles to the eastward, as we expected, on the fol- 

 lowing morning we found, greatly to our surprise, that 

 we had been set on the opposite side of it, and much 



