48 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION A. 



the first to see and trace the fact, and work out the laws which 

 govern it. Flinders himself shews {loc. cit., Vol. II., App. p. 512) 

 that Mr. Males had observed the fact that magnetic bearings on 

 ship board were unreliable, but he attributed it to faults in the 

 compasses and imperfections in construction, and it is quite 

 evident that he did not see the real cause, viz. : the ship's 

 magnetism, which Flinders did and worked at it until he found 

 the law of change, viz. : that it was in proportion to the lines of 

 the angles of deviation, due to the ship's position and could thus 

 cori"ect every observation. Flinders communicated his discovery 

 in a paper read before the Royal Society, (Phil. Trans., 1805, 

 p. 186.) 



Barlow very soon after proposed that an iron plate should be 

 put below the compass in wooden ships. Airy, the Astronomer 

 Royal, proposed a steel magnet below the compass, but neither 

 suggestion was of much use, and the discussion going on upon the 

 subject led to the Rev. Dr. Scoresby's voyage to Australia, with 

 the object of working out a true theory of correction, with the 

 result that he proposed placing it aloft out of the reach of the 

 ship's attraction, a method still in general use. And finally to Sir 

 William Thompson's method of correcting the ship's magnetism 

 by a series of magnets placed below the compass. 



Admiral Phillip Parker King. 



Captain P. P. King, the son of Governor King, was one of the 

 earliest workers in the field of science in Australia. 



In the year 1817 the British Government resolved to send him, 

 then a lieutenant, to complete the surveys of the coasts of New 

 South Wales. He arrived in Port Jackson in September, 1817, 

 with Messrs. Bedwell and Roe as his assistants, and in Sydney 

 his party was joined by Allan Cunningham, "the King's 

 Botanist " in the Colony. 



In these voyages, which extended over four years, December, 

 1817, to April, 1822, during which he received promotion, 

 Captain King, in addition to his maritime discoveries and to the 

 study of natui'al history in general, gave much attention to the 

 physical conditions and climate of the various pai'ts of the coast 

 which he visited, and also to the customs and language of the 

 aboriginal inhabitants. 



He also carefully determined the longitude of a number of 

 important positions in the survey. 



In recognition of his ability and services the Royal Society 

 elected him as one of its Fellows, and he was also elected as •a 

 Member of the Linnean and Royal Asiatic Societies. 



The result of his survey was published in two volumes, entitled 

 " A Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western 

 Coasts of Australia." (2 Vols. 8vo., London, 1827.) 



Charts of the coast henceforward designated by him and others 



