442 HURRICANE. 



Mangaia Island, the natives of which gave notice 

 of its approach ; and at Tahiti Captain Sullivan 



to a storm, and veering again to the eastward, the ship was 

 brought to the wind on the port tack under a main trysail. For 

 the hours 5 and 6, she headed from South to S. W., which would 

 give for the direction of the wind about S. E. by E. At 6*30 

 a man was washed away with the lee quarter-boat. At 8, the 

 wind had veered to S. by W., having blown a hurricane, with 

 constant rain for the last hour; at 9 most of the half ports were 

 washed away, the sea making a clean sweep over the decks. By 

 midnight the wind had subsided to a whole gale ; but still 

 veering had reached the W. S.W. point, and at 3 the next morn- 

 ing it was blowing only a moderate breeze from W. N. W., with 

 tolerably clear weather. Sail was now made, and a S. W. by S. 

 course held for 28 miles, when by the noon observation the 

 latitude was 22° l' S., longitude, by chronometer, 158° 44' W. 

 The day following the hurricane the wind was moderate from the 

 westward ; and on that previous to it of about the same strength 

 from the northward. The ship's position at noon of the latter 

 day was about 130 miles to the N. E, by E. of Mangaia Island. 

 The duration of this storm, then, may be considered to have been 

 from 4 p. M. to midnight, in which eight hours the wind had 

 veered gradually from East round by South to W. S. W. The veer- 

 ing being much more rapid between 8 and 9 p. m. when the storm 

 was at its height, the ship must at that time, have been nearer 

 the focus. The tack on which the Favourite was hove to carried 

 her into the course of the hurricane, or rather placed her in a 

 position to be overtaken by it, as it passed along to the southward 

 and westward ; but as the ship broke off to the westward and 

 northward, she fell out of its north-western edge. Doubtless, if a 

 W.N.W. course had been pursued in the first instance, or at 

 noon on the 17th, the Favourite would have avoided the storm. 

 It is to be regretted that the barometer was broken in the cocn- 

 mencement of the hurricane, when it was unusually low, having 



