Lima, September 16th, 1862.

Permission is granted to the memorialist to introduce colonists from the Oceanic Islands, on condition that he shall submit to the provisions of the law of the 14th of May last, No. 281-62.

MORALES.

Lima, 26th September, 1862.

Handed over to Monsieur Arturo Wholey, in order that by means

of it he may introduce colonists.

ANDRES A. CALDERON.

The further reading of this paper was postponed until the next meeting of the Club.

F: Fixed. Ffl. Fixed and Flashing. R. Revolving. I. Intermitting. Est. Established.

(a.) 42.-Doubts having arisen with reference to the situation of the lighthouse on the island of Favignana, off the West coast of Sicily, as given by the Sicilian Government in October, 1860, Staff-Commander Stokes, of H.M. surveying-vessel Growler, has recently determined its correct position. The lighthouse stands not on Point Sottile, as stated in the Sicilian notice, but on Point Ferro, the low rocky western extreme of the island, and navigators are hereby informed accordingly.

(b.) 45.-The Corporation of the Trinity House, London, has given notice, that the Sunk Light-vessel at the entrance to the East Swin, has been removed 34 miles N.E. E. from her former position. The vessel now lies in 9 fathoms water at low springs, with the West Rocks buoy open a little eastward of Harwich Church, bearing N.N.W. W.; the Gunfleet lighthouse WAS., distant 7-3 miles; Naze tower N.W.W., 8:8 miles; the Shipwash light-vessel N.E. N., 12.7 miles; S. W. Shipwash buoy N.E., 4-7 miles; and the Long Sand Head buoy S.S.E. E., 4.8 miles.

North Sea, Coast of Holland. With reference to the Notice to Mariners, No. 37. dated the 19th day of August, 1868, the Ter Schelling revolving light, therein said as being about to be altered in 1864-5 to a fixed red light, it should have been to a fixed white light.

APPROACHES TO PORTLAND HARBOUR,-Maine, United States, Atlantic Coast.

The following rocks, not upon any chart, have been surveyed by Lieutenant-Commander T. S. Phelps, U.S. Navy, Assistant U.S. Coast Survey

Witch Rock.-24 feet water: Portland lighthouse, W.b.N. nearly, distant 13 miles; middle of Ram Island, N.N.W., distant mile.

Willard Rock.-313 feet water: Portland lighthouse, N.W.b.N. N. nearly, distant 12 miles; Cape Elizabeth East lighthouse, S. W.b.S. S., distant 2 miles; Trundy Reef buoy, S.W. W., distant & mile.

West Cod Ledge.-33 feet water: Portland lighthouse, N.W. N., distant 45 miles; Cape Elizabeth East lighthouse, W. N., distant 3 miles.; Alden Rock buoy, S.W.b.W., distant 1 miles.

Corwin Rock.-24 feet water: Portland lighthouse, N.N.W. nearly, distant 4 miles; Cape Elizabeth East lighthouse, N.W.b.W. W., distant 2 miles; Alden Rock buoy, S.W.b.W. distant mile.

West Hue and Cry Rocks.-27 feet water: Cape Elizabeth East lighthouse, N.N.W., distant 2 miles; barn on Richmond Island, N.W.b.W. W., distant 34 miles; Alden Rock buoy, N.E.b.N. N., distant 1 miles.

Bulwark Shoal, surveyed by E. Cordell, Acting Assistant, has fourteen feet water on it. The depth of six feet heretofore given on the chart is an error.

The bearings are magnetic. The distances are in nautical miles. The depths are at mean low water.

GRAHAM SHOAL, South of Sicily.

The readers of the Nautical will very well remember the appearance of a volcanic island on the South coast of Sicily, a view of which we gave in one of our early volumes (1839), and on which island the British flag was planted. This island, however, soon gradually disappeared (like Sabrina of the Azores) and left no further vestige of it than a shoal, the position of which is very well known, and laid down in our charts as Graham Shoal. But the correspondents of our papers, not aware that Graham Shoal was once an island, and that it has been so long on the charts, speak of it as a new discovery, when there is really nothing new about it, and allude to delusive currents and "flexuous" coasts, us if all these things were novelties! But here is some account of it from an officer who visited it, provided for us by our friend Nauticus," which we give in the words of Captain Lord F. H. Kerr, who visited the shoal in the course of his service.

H.M. S. Blenheim, Pembroke Dock, October 19th. Sir, I have lately observed two notices in the Times from a Malta correspondent relative to the rediscovery, as he calls it, of Graham Shoal. In the first he expresses wonder that it should have remained so long unknown, and is inclined to throw blame on the authorities for not having been more energetic. In the second he dilates on the

great importance to navigators of the rediscovery of this dangerous rock. With reference to the first, and in justification of one authority, I would inform him that when Admiral Sir William Parker was Commander-in-Chief in the Mediterranean in 1851, he was so dissatisfied with former examinations of this shoal, which represented it to have sunk to a depth of 36 fathoms, that he sent the Scourge steam sloop, which I then commanded, for the express purpose of examining the locality, and after several fruitless attempts, owing to boisterous weather, I succeeded in finding the real Graham Shoal, on which I anchored on the night of the 10th of April, 1851, and, having made a careful survey on the following day, found only 16 feet of water on the shallowest part. This discovery was at once reported to Sir W. Parker, my letter and drawings forwarded to the Admiralty, and a chart was issued from the hydrographer's office, which I have now before me, dated 1851, in which the form of the shoal is sketched, with the depth of water noted as 10 feet, one fathom less than reported by me.

The fact was locally made known at Malta immediately, by handbills published (if I remember right) by the Chamber of Commerce; so I think your correspondent has found a "mare's nest." I made another examination in 1852, when the shoal was apparently unchanged. The 36 fathom bank, which had been mistaken for Graham Shoal in previons surveys between 1841 and 1851, will be seen marked on the same chart, and is now called Ramsay Patch. I was not the person who hoisted the flag on the shoal when an island, as surmised in the first notice alluded to in the Times of September 28th. I am, &c.,

FRED. H. KERR, Captain, R.N.

HAYMET ROCKS,-Pacific.-Reliable information has been received from Commander Mayne, of H.M.S. Eclipse, that the cutter Will Watch, J. E. Haymet master and owner, from Auckland to Rarotonga, passed between two rocks, striking on the northern one and damaging her false keel. They are considered to be about quarter of a mile apart, with apparently seven or eight feet water on them; in lat. 27° 11′ S., long. 160° 13′ W.

JACK REEF,-Indian Ocean.-The Ceylon Times of the 18th August, 1863, has given notice that on the morning of the 11th August, 1863, Captain Jack, of the barque Eddystone, recently arrived at Colombo from Aden, discovered a dangerous coral reef in lat. 10° 10' N., long. 63° 40′ E., apparently above water and about two miles in extent. Captain Jack passed close to the reef, sounding in ten, nine, eight, and seven fathoms water. As it lies in the track between Ceylon and the Red Sea, mariners are cautioned, and requested to obtain and forward to this journal any notice of it that may assist in verifying its position.

After a passage of eighteen or twenty days, a ship arriving from Europe in sight of the Mexican coast in the vicinity of Vera Cruz, has before her the magnificent peak of Orizaba, half concealed by clouds, and anchors within a triangle in the roads of Vera Cruz, formed by the town and its fort, the isle of Sacrificios, and Isle Verd. It is the only roadstead on the eastern shore of Mexico, bad as it is, and one from which on the approach of a gale it is most prudent for a ship to leave and get to sea. The roadstead, as is well known, is protected by the castle of Ulloa, standing on a rocky islet tolerably elevated above the sea.

Vera Cruz was built about the end of the sixteenth century, by order of the Count de Monterey, at a short distance from the old town of Villarica, erected in 1519 by Fernando Cortes, on the territory of Totoneques. It is seated on a wide sandy plain, surrounded by a semicircular wall in bad condition, the two ends of which spring from two forts by the sea side. The streets are wide, long, and well paved, and it is well provided with fountains supplied by the River Jamapa. Of the three promenades of the town the favourite one is that of the Mole. The Alemeda is dismal, and that of Malibran does not suit pedestrians, being spoiled by dust and sand.

Vera Cruz, the population of which may be estimated from twelve to fifteen thousand souls, is on the whole rather picturesque. It has some handsome houses, but there are also others very ugly and very much out of place. Besides this, the streets which extend along the NO. 12.-VOL. XXXII.

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shore on each side of the mole are veritable drains, rendered still more filthy by the nuisance of zopilotis which swarm in them. These are birds belonging to the vulture kind, and are gifted with an appetite so voracious that nothing comes amiss to them: in fact, they are the scavengers of the streets, relieving them perpetually of the vegetable and animal offal which they find there. Their useful services thus form their protection, for they are not allowed to be molested on any account under penalty of a severe fine.

For persons not accustomed to warm climates Vera Cruz is one of the worst places in the world. Yellow fever is common and is commonly called the vomito negro, prevailing at a particular season of the year. The greater the number of persons who first land there at one time, the less is the chance of all escaping the fever, and the younger or more robust they may be, the sooner will it attack them. M. Mathew de Fossey, who has long resided there, speaks thus of it. "Three principal causes produce yellow fever: these are, very great heat; the vicinity of marsh, and a number of persons who are not acclimatized. But it is necessary that these causes should be united; for if either one is wanting there will be no fever.

"It is in the month of May, when the sun reaches the zenith and heats the atmosphere that the germ of the yellow fever is common, increases in intensity up to September, and disappears in November. This is also the time when the water from the rains inundates the

ground, forming lagoons where it cannot escape. The air is also saturated with vapours, drawn out by the vertical sun, that carry with them morbid miasmas and the effluvium of vegetable matter decomposed from the swampy soil.

"If travellers at this period inhale this pestilential atmosphere, they are struck down with it at once. In vain do they, whose commercial interests do not detain them, flee from the port to more salubrious places; for they take with them the germs of the disorder, which speedily shows itself, and overcome by sickness the next day they are

no more.

"It is remarkable that travellers attacked by yellow fever in leaving Vera Cruz seldom get beyond Puebla; they die at Jalapa, or Puente National, or even at Santa Fe, not above three leagues from the

coast.

"Women and children and elderly persons are more likely to escape than robust young men. The ships in the roadstead do not escape, for there the breeze carries the poisonous miasma, and full often the whole crew of a ship sleeping between decks on a fine night are found attacked in the morning by the malady.

"During the ravages of yellow fever at Vera Cruz, the northerly wind will sometimes bring appeasing intervals to the unfortunate individuals who are decimated every day. As long as this wind lasts, the temperature becomes more moderate, and death spares his victims It is at this period that Vera Cruz presents a singular appearance, arising from the fact that the strength of this wind is so great that the people are compelled to barricade their doors and windows. Pas