SAILING DfllECTIONS. 
309 
January and February the monsoon is at its strength, but 
declines towards the end of the latter month, and in March 
becomes variable, with dark, cloudy, and unsettled weather; 
the wind is then generally from the S.W., but not at all 
regular. 
The current sets with the wind, and seldom exceeds 
a knot or a knot and a half per hour; between Capes 
Wessel and Van Diemen it is not stronger, and its course 
in the easterly monsoon, when only we had any experience 
of it, was West : the strength is probably increased or dimi- 
nished by the state of the wind. 
The tides are of trifling consequence ; the flood comes from 
the eastward, but rarely rises more than ten feet, or runs so 
much as a mile and a half per hour. High water takes place 
at full and change at Liverpool River, and Goulburn Island 
at six o'clock, at the entrance of the Alligator Rivers in Van 
Diemen’s Gulf, at 8h 15', and at the south end of Apsley 
Strait at 3h 25'*. The flood-tide comes from the eastward, 
excepting when its course is altered by local circumstances ; 
the rise is not more than eleven feet at the springs. 
The variation of the compass in this interval is scarcely 
affected by the ship’s local attraction. Off* Cape Wessel it 
is between 3° and 4° East; at Liverpool River about 
East, at Goulburn Islands 2o East, and off* Cape Van Die- 
men, not more that IJ® East, 
The dip of the south end of the needle at Goulburn Island 
was 27° 32i'. 
When the survey of the Gulf of Carpentaria was com- 
pleted by Captain Flinders, his vessel proved to be so unfit 
* In St. Asaph’s Bay, Lieutenant Roe found high-water take 
place at full and change at 5h 45' ; and in King’s Cove at 5h 15' ; at 
the latter place it rose fourteen feet. 
A. 
Sect. II L 
N, Coast. 
