,1832.] Progress of Indian Maritime Surveys. 331 



-Surveyor General to the Supreme Government. The reputation of 

 this officer stands already too high to be affected by any commenda- 

 tions we might bestow upon the works he has produced. We look 

 upon the charts as complete models in their kind, knowing them to 

 be constructed with a care and a regard to scientific accuracy, cre- 

 ditable alike to himself, and to the Government, which approving his 

 cautious methods, leaves him to prosecute his surveys as his own good 

 sense may suggest, unembarrassed by minute instructions, and with 

 merely the locality and direction of his investigations indicated before- 

 hand. The result is, that charts are annually produced, which con- 

 vert tracts of complete terra incognita, or coasts roughly laid down 

 from the loose bearings and observations of casual voyages, into lines 

 of accurately defined and well delineated shore, with the mountains and 

 highlands, the bays and harbours, the rivers and watering places, and 

 all the towns or villages, within observation from the sea, correctly 

 set down. Each of these charts is a new acquisition to geography, 

 quite independent of the service done to navigation by laying down 

 the real position and bearings of dangers, visible or hidden ; and by 

 enabling every nautical man, on approaching the coast surveyed, to 

 know for certain where he is, and what course he should steer in pro- 

 secution of the voyage he has in hand. 



A coast once laid down by the accurate methods pursued by 

 Captain Ross, needs never to be surveyed a second time. Future 

 investigators may complete what from circumstances may have 

 been left by him imperfect. They may add a few new lines of 

 soundings, but they will find nothing to find fault with or to require 

 correction. Indeed, the confidence with which practical navigators, 

 when once they come upon the ground included in his surveys, follow 

 boldly his directions, and shape their course at pleasure, in the most 

 intricate passages, is both a compliment to his industry and professional 

 skill, and a proof of his well-earned reputation in the depart- 

 ment. 



Captain Ross was, we believe, first employed in surveying various 

 portions of the China Seas, under the orders of the Court of Directors, 

 issued as far back as in the year 1806. These surveys occupied him 

 14 years, and embraced all the most prominent dangers of the fre- 

 quented passages of navigation to and from China, and all the most 

 important coasts of that empire. The charts were separately pub- 

 lished, as they were completed, but the whole were afterwards incor- 

 porated in the General Chart published by the hydrographer of the 

 Company; and which bears Mr. Horsburgh's name. 



