274 TRAVELS IlsT 
The annexed chart of Table Bay was constructed by order 
of Governor Van de Graaff in the year 1786, and has been 
found, by a diligent examination, to be extremely accurate. 
The anchoring-ground in general is tolerably good, but the 
shifting of the sand leaves bare sometimes whole ridges of the 
same kind of hard blue schistus that appears every where on 
the west shore of the bay. These ridges are so sharp, that a 
cable coming across them is sure to be cut in pieces. This 
has happened so frequently, that the bay is full of anchors, 
which have never been fished up ; and these contribute equally 
with the rocks, to cut and chafe the cables of other ships. 
If some pains be not taken to remove the anchors, the num- 
ber of which increase every year, there will not, in time, be a 
clear anchorage for a single large ship. When the Dutch 
Admiral Dekker's squadron was blown out of Table Bay in, 
February 1803, they left six or eight anchors behind.. 
Admiral Pringle,^ I understand, was of opinion that the in- 
convenience arising from the rocks and the lost anchors was 
in some degree remediable, by sinking mooring-chains for the 
large ships, instead of their lying at anchor. In the south-east 
winds, which blow from September to the end of April, and 
which is the season when all ships bound for the Cape resort 
to Table Bay, there is no other danger than that of being 
driven out to sea from the wear and tear of the cables; though 
the water is not smooth, yet the sea is not high, and it is next 
to impossible for a ship to go on shore, unless on the south 
point of Robben Island, which they have always time enough 
to avoid, the distance being seven or eight miles. Within 
this island and the continent there is excellent anchorage, 
