1054 Third Memoir with reference to [No» 106. 



ing to for twelve hours would have saved them all the heavy loss 

 which they must have incurred ; — to say nothing of the awful risk 

 of foundering, which three out of the four certainly ran. If we take 

 the amount of losses by these ships, and that by the Marion and others, 

 we shall have a very large sum ; the greater part of which might 

 probably have been saved by the simple use of our knowledge of the 

 Law of Storms. We see that they had successively the gale increasing 

 to a storm from North to ENE. and ESE. The centre of the vortex must 

 then have been to the Southward and SEastward of them, and their safe 

 plan was, to heave to, for a few hours, on the starboard tack ; when, 

 being always on the right hand side of its path, they would have had 

 the wind draw from ENE. to SE. and SSE. as we see it did with the 

 Nusserath Shaw on the SOth and successively with all the others. The 

 wind would then have been about at the violence of a gale, as it was 

 with the Tenasserim; at the very time it was dismasting the Nusse- 

 rath Shaw ; and with the George and Mary when it was tearing the 

 Freak and Vectis to pieces. 



The Diagrams, 



As for the 27^A we have only two vessels on opposite sides of a circle, 

 and no shift of wind, or other corroborative evidence, I have not 

 thought it worth while to give a diagram for this day ; nor for the 28^/^, 

 where the centre depends partly upon the rate at which the vortex may 

 have been travelling, and partly on the correctness of the Nusserath 

 Shaw's position at noon. I have already stated why I take the circle 

 of the hurricane not to have much exceeded 300 miles on this day. 



On the 29th and following days, however, we have several ships, and 

 these complications require a diagram to illustrate them, which I have 

 accordingly, as before, given for each^.ay. 



Since the foregoing pages, were placed in the hands of the printer 

 I have been favoured by Captain Pope, of the ship Marion, with a 

 copy of his protest in consequence of the dismasting of that ship. 

 The following is a summary extract from it, altered to Civil time. 



" The gale may be said to have fully commenced by noon on the 2^th 

 April 1840, at which time she was in Lat. 15° 10' N. Long. 90° 15' E., 

 and it was then blowing a hard gale at NE. By 3 p.m. Barometer 

 falling fast, made every preparation for bad weather. At 5h. 30' p.m. a 

 complete hurricane ; the ship hove to on the larboard tack. A little 



