210 Cruise of the "Alert" 



having lofty curved bows and sterns. They carried a huge 

 triangular sail, which, when going before the wind, is set right 

 athwart-ships with the apex downwards, and when beating seemed 

 to be used like a reversible Fiji sail. On November 17th we 

 passed through the long strait which lays between the islands of 

 Banka and Sumatra, and on the afternoon of the following day 

 dropped our anchor in the roadstead of Singapore. 



We made a stay of two and a half months at the great com- 

 mercial city of Singapore, and for the greater part of the time our 

 ship lay at the Tanjon Paggar dockyard, where she underwent a 

 thorough overhaul, while officers and men had abundant oppor- 

 tunities for relaxation and amusements. 



On February 5th, 1882, we again got under way, and quitting 

 the eastern Archipelago by the Straits of Malacca, steered for 

 Ceylon. On the 10th of February, in latitude 6° 15' N., longi- 

 tude 93 30' E., we passed through several remarkable patches of 

 broken water, resembling " tiderips." There was a light northerly 

 breeze, and the general surface of the sea was smooth, so that 

 these curious patches could be distinctly seen when a couple of 

 miles ahead of us, and as we entered each one the noise of tumbling 

 foaming waters was so loud as to attract one's attention forcibly, 

 even when sitting down below in the ward-room. The patches 

 were for the most part disposed in curves and more or less com- 

 plete circles of half-a-mile in diameter, so that at a distance they 

 bore a strong resemblance to lines of breakers. Soundings were 

 taken, but no inequality in the sea-bed was observed sufficient to 

 account for them. They were most probably due to circular 

 currents revolving in opposite directions, and producing the broken 

 water at their points of contact. 



We stopped for two days, February the 17th and 18th, at 

 Colombo, the capital of Ceylon, and then steered for the " Eighth 

 Degree Channel," north of the Maldive Islands, after passing through 

 which we shaped a straight course for the Seychelle Islands. 



On the morning of the 4th of March land was reported right 



