588 Researches on the Gale and Hurricane [July, 



Let us begin with the H. C. S. Amherst, which we find very pro- 

 perly stood out to sea from the tail of the Eastern sea reefs. Had her 

 Commander not been acquainted with the Sand Heads, she might 

 have been placed in great danger by standing in, as she then must 

 have anchored in a most perilous position. This was probably the fate 

 of the unfortunate Protector, in which 135 soldiers were lost beside 

 the crew and the passengers, in the gale of October, 1838.* 



The Pilot vessels, whose business moreover it was to keep as near to 

 their station as they could with safety, were well managed of course ; as 

 were also the Sarah and I believe the John Hepbume, a Schooner from 

 Rangoon ; though I have not been able to procure this last vessel's log. 



On the South-side of the hurricane, however, many of the vessels 

 seem running into it, and this some of them certainly did. The Mary 

 Somerville was fortunately prevented from doing so, by the accident 

 to her foretop-mast, obliging her to lie too, but the Ann Lockerby, 

 Justina, and Eden seem to have run right towards it. 



The Susan's track shows a course made much too far to the West- 

 ward for the winds laid down; this is only to be accounted for by the 

 erroneous estimate of her position, and the Westerly current which is 

 adverted to in the logs of the Nine and Jane. 



The barometrical observations are for the most part so few and scat- 

 tered that I have been unable to trace any connected series of them 

 worth adverting to. As usual the barometer has clearly enough an- 

 nounced the approach or vicinity of bad weather, and the Simpiesome- 

 ter still earlier. I have before stated that I was unable to obtain more 

 than one single notice of the heights of the vessels' barometers in the 

 port of Calcutta ! and thus we are left to doubt as to the correctness 

 of even those instruments of which we have the registered observations. 

 Thus the ' Nine's' barometer indicated a very remarkable depression 

 on the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd June, but was it a correct one? The low rate 

 of pay on board our merchant ships makes it a heavy tax upon a com- 

 mander to provide himself with instruments from the best makers. I 

 cannot quit this part of the subject, however, without citing the highly 

 creditable barometrical observations of Mr. Hudson, commanding the 

 Honorable Company's Floating Light Vessel " Hope/' marked in the 

 tables as the Upper Light Vessel. I have only there quoted his baro- 

 meter for noon ; the following is the register annexed to his log, and. 

 brief notes of the weather from it — 



* The remarks on the appearance of the Arracan mountains on the 29th, and the 

 clear sky and peculiar sensibility to noise on board at the approach of the gale, are 

 very interesting : the two last may have been electrical phenomena, and the first will 

 remind the seaman of "the Devil's table cloth," at the approach of a South-easter in 

 Table Bay. 



