ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN HARRIS. 45 



chief of the Cape station : and during- our subse- 

 quent stay received every attention which kindness 

 and courtesy could suggest, from himself and his 

 officers. 



We were glad to ascertain that our chronometers 

 had been performing admirably. They gave the 

 longitude of Simon's Bay, within a few seconds of 

 our homeward determination during the last voyage. 

 Mr. Maclear, of the Royal Observatory, and Cap- 

 tain Wauchope, of the flag-ship, had been measur- 

 ing the difference of longitude between Simon's 

 Bay dock -yard and Cape -Town Observatory, by 

 flashing lights upon the summit of a mountain mid- 

 way between those two places. Their trials gave 

 a greater difference, by a half-second, between the 

 two meridians, than we had obtained on a former 

 visit by carrying chronometers to and fro. The 

 results stand as follow : 



s 



Mr. Maclear and Captain "Wauchope . 11 '5" 



H.M. Sloop, "Beagle" . . . ll'O 



We found at the Cape the renowned Captain 

 Harris, H.E.I. Company's Bombay Engineers, who 

 had just returned from his sporting expedition 

 into the interior of Southern Africa, having made 

 his way through every obstacle, from the frontier 

 of the Cape Colony, through the territories of the 

 chief Moselekatse, to the Tropic of Capricorn. 

 With his spirit-stirring accounts of hunting adven- 

 ture and savage manners we were all most highly 

 gratified. What he had seen, where he had been, 



