1842.] Fifth Memoir on the Law of Storms. 19 



she is about as far from the centre at noon on the 16th as she was at 

 noon of the 15th, and that the weather seems to have moderated on the 

 former day to about the degree of violence at which it was on the latter, 

 which is also an indirect testimony to the truth of our estimate of the 

 places of the centres. These are tolerable good data for the centre of 

 the 16th, and as the storm was then rapidly approaching the shore, it 

 would as usual, in all probability, begin to show those anomalies which 

 there seems no reason to doubt do occur when this is the case. It is 

 most unfortunate that w T e have not, in the logs of the J. W. Dare and 

 other vessels, any computed positions, even by dead reckoning, and not 

 even a longitude ! Nothing can more truly show the difficulty we 

 meet with in procuring our information, than the fact, that in this in- 

 stance, even the Master Attendant of the port could get only returns de- 

 ficient in one of the most essential points ! 



I was at first inclined to supposed that the shift of wind experienced 

 by the Catharine might have been that of another storm, which reaching 

 Vizagapatam on the 18th was the cause of the loss of the Isadora, but the 

 entire want of latitudes and longitudes, and even of the direction of the 

 wind in the storm of the 18th at Vizagapatam, prevent our tracing this 

 theory. Vizagapatam is however such a very unsafe anchorage for a 

 vessel of any size in most weathers, that the Isadora may as probably 

 have been wrecked by a strong Southerly gale as by a N. Easterly or Nor- 

 therly one. I am inclined to suppose that it was merely a monsoon 

 gale — i. e. the monsoon setting in with the force of a gale ; which very 

 frequently occurs. 



I have before alluded to the rate of motion of this storm, which was 

 apparently as high as 14-- per hour. I have made the vortex 310 miles 

 in diameter, because I think that the logs of the Hydroose and Petite 

 Suzanne fairly shew them to be about on the outer verge of the storm 

 at noon on the 15th, and from those of the Amelia and Catherine to the 

 North and South, with the changes experienced by the Hydroose and 

 Petite Suzanne to the East, and at Madras to the West, we cannot 

 take it at less on the 16th. 



Our only reports of its progress inland, where it would first meet with 

 the lower ranges of the Eastern Ghauts forming the Pulicat Hills, about 

 60 miles inland from the coast, and successively with those which flank 

 the table lands of Mysore, are those from the Assistant Surveyor General 



