PLEASURES OF TIDE- WATCHING 21 



my mind one of its most indelible impressions of the 

 Marine Survey of India. When the officer in charge 

 of the sounding-party can no longer see to take angles, 

 he wends his weary way to the ship, and he reaches 

 her in the course of time, if there is no particular 

 current against him. But if he gets into a tide-rip — 

 as he very easily may in the Andamans — he has to 

 make the best of things until the ship can find time 

 to look for him. 



As for the tide-watchers, we must leave them to 

 the sympathy of those who indulge an introspective 

 turn of mind, for to them there comes, as the gift of 

 fortune, that unspeakable release from worldly distrac- 

 tions that lies beyond all the efforts of all the philoso- 

 phies. They will retire to a convenient creek in which 

 to set up their tide-pole, then they will run up a 

 rough shelter of canvas, under which to store their 

 three weeks' or month's supply of rations and drinking 

 water, and there, in sole communion with the sky, they 

 will ''watch the moving waters." Regularly every 

 half-hour they will be recalled to earth by the necessity 

 of recording the height of the water shown on the 

 tide-pole. 



So much for the practical part of the ship's routine, 

 of which I speak merely as an interested spectator, 

 and not with the authority of an actor. 



We must next clear our preliminary approaches to 



