20O A. D. 1790. 



1790 February 25"" — ^Tn the year 1784 General Roy, a gentleman of 

 great mathematical and geographical icience, by his Majefty's command 

 made a very accurate meafurement of a bafe on Honflow heath, pre- 

 paratory to a furvey to be made by a feries of triangles extending to the 

 eafl coaft of Kent, and thence to the coaft of France, for the purpofe of 

 afcertaining precifely the relative fituations of the royal obfervatories of 

 Greenwich and Paris, whereby the maps and charts ot the two countries 

 may be rendered reciprocally more ufeful than they have hitherto been. 

 A mod capital inftrument, which the general, in his delcription of it, 

 fays, * may be called a great theodolet,' having been made by Mr. 

 Ramfden exprefsly for the furvey, and a correfpondence opened with 

 the academy of fciences at Paris refpe6ling the co-operation expected on 

 their part, that learned body appointed the comte de Caflini *, with 

 Meflieurs Mechain and Le Gendre-, to concert with the general and 

 Doctor Blagden the operations to be performed on each coaft. On the 

 23"* of September 1787 thefe nmbajfadors of fclence met at Dover, and 

 immediately adjufled their^plan. By the help of white lights, ufed on 

 the preconcerted nights, they were enabled ' to eftablifh forever the 



• triangular connexion between the two countries :' and the other tri- 

 angles were taken with unparalleled exadnefs in the fummers of 1787 

 and 1788. The general now laid before the royal fociety a memoir, 

 containing an account of his operations ; and he recommended, ' that 

 ' the trigonometrical operation, fo fuccefsfully begun, fhould be con- 



* tinued, and gradually extended over the v/hole ifland,'and, by means 

 of white lights, alfo to Ireland, by which means only we can obtain 

 good maps of the Britifh iflands. 



It is proper to add, that his advice has been followed ; that the fur- 

 vey is fiill going on under the direction of eminent geographers, who 

 have been appointed to the fuperintendence of this great national work, 

 iince death deprived the country of the valuable fervices of General 

 Roy ; and that we may hope to. fee the day, when it fliall no longer be 

 faid that Britifh navigators find the coafts of their own country lefs ac- 

 curately laid down in their charts than thofe of almofl any other coun- 

 try they have occafion to vifit. 



The Britifh government in India and Tippoo Saib, the fultan of My- 

 fore, had never been cordially reconciled : and in March 1790 their 

 mutual animofities upon a very trifling occafion broke out in hoftilities, 

 of which it is fortunately not my province to enter into any narrative. 



The planters and merchants intereft:ed in the Weft-India iflands hav- 

 ing reprefented to government, that the bread-fruit of the South-fea 

 iflands would be a valuable acquifltion to the Weft-Indies as a fecurity 

 againft the famines, which have fometimes made fuch dreadful havock 



* The author of the great map of Fiance on a fcale of two miles to an inch. 



