Page:Narrative of a survey of the intertropical and western coasts of Australia, Volume 2.djvu/334

 Januarr and February the monsoon is at its s.trenkeh, but declines towards the end of the latter month, and in MareIt Sect. IlL becomes variable, with dark, cloudy, and.unsettled weaer; N. Coast. the wind is theh generally from the S.W., but not at all regular. The current sets with the wind,. and seldom exeeeds 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 bad 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 plaee at full and change at Liverpool River, and Goulburn Island at six. o'eloek, at the entrance of the .Alligator Rivers in Van Diemen's Gulf, at 8b 15',. and at the south end of Apsley Strait at 3h 25 '. The flood-tide eomes from the eastward, exeepting when its eourse is altered by local eireumstanees; the rise is not more than eleven feet at the springs. The variation of the compass in this interval is seareely afiected by the ship's local attrnction. Off Cape Wessel it is between 3 � 4 �t; at Liverpool River about 1 �ast, at Gouiburn Islands 20 East, and of Cape Van Die, men, not more that 1 �t. The dip of the south end of the needle at Goulburn Island was 7o 32'. When the survey of the Gulf of Carpenterln ws oom- pieted by Captain Flinders, his vessel proved to be so anflt �place st full andclmnge t h 4; and in King's ove at 6h 1' i   le.tter plt it rose fourteen fet,
 * In St. Asph's By, Lieutenant Roe found high-ter take

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