336 
AT SEA. 
sufficiently red to have originally given a name to the sea, from 
their colour. Calms continued to baffle us, and when a breeze 
sprang up it came from the northward. 
January. 15. — ^On the 14th, we had only light airs or calms, 
which brought us by twelve to 56° 45' N. On the 14th, at night, 
we had no alteration for the better; but the scene was changed, by 
our being the next morning close over on the Arabian shore, within 
sight of the islands of Tiran and Shaduan, and nearly opposite to 
Ras Mohammed. Before night the wind freshened to a gale from 
the N. W. We stood in close to the Jaffateen islands. 
January ^1. — From the 15th, to the 51st, the gale continued 
from the N.W., blowing through the narrow straits between Sha- 
duan and Ras Mohammed, with a violence equal to any thing I 
have experienced. We were generally obliged to lie to under our 
fore and mizen stay-sails ; but whenever it moderated a little, we 
were glad to carry our courses, to avoid being driven to the south- 
ward. In this we succeeded, so that on the fifth day we were with- 
in a mile of the same position, in which we were on the first. The 
sea had been so rough as to deprive us of all rest at night, and all 
cornfort ia the day. The dead lights rendered our little cabin 
gloomy, and the water which washed in, in defiance of them, made 
it as damp as the deck. We stretched across from shore to shore, 
and had therefore several good opportunities of ascertaining the 
real position of Tiran : it is in latitude 57° 43' N. longitude 34° 57' 
50" E. It rises to a point in the centre, and has a small island at 
each end, which, at a little distance, appears as if attached to it. 
It is laid down by Sir Home Popham too far within the Gulf of 
Akaba. 
