INDIAN MARINE SURVEYS. 17 



24 Hydrographic Notices, 172 Notices to Mariners, 5 Annual 

 Returns of Wrecks and Casualties in Indian Waters (1876-1880), 

 6 editions of the List of Lighthouses and Light-vessels in British 

 India (1876-1881), and various other useful publications, including 

 Spheroidal Tables, Glossary of French Nautical Terms, Tables of 

 Natural Scales, Table of Distances at which Objects are seen at 

 Sea, &c. The advantages, too, of a chart depdt at Calcutta, where 

 hydiographical publications could be promptly obtained without the 

 long delay of reference to England, were beginning to be fully 

 appreciated by the mercantile public, and in 1880-81 1785 charts 

 were sold, being at the rate of between five and six charts a day. 



Such were the results accomplished by the Department during its 

 brief existence. Under the superintendence of its able and devoted 

 chief, and with the co-operation of its energetic officers, it had 

 made a position for itself, and its good work was beginning to be 

 known and thoroughly appreciated by the mercantile marine 

 frequenting Indian seas. Had it been able to survive those internal 

 and external petty jealousies, from which no public department, any 

 more than any other human institution, is exempt, it would 

 undoubtedly have achieved a long record of good work, worthy of 

 comparison with that, which during the present century, has made 

 the history of Indian land surveys so famous and brilliant. Un- 

 doubtedly much of the marine survey work has since been continued 

 by earnest and capable hands. But the break-up of a department 

 is seldom unaccompanied by evils ; the old personnel vanishes, 

 the old lines are obliterated, the experience which it has taken years 

 to build up, is either discredited or wholly lost, and the result is, 

 even at the best, a serious interruption to that record of continued 

 progress and development which are the aim of all English 

 administrations. 



