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Updated: May 6, 2025
I fetched my sextant and took the sun; and I may say confidently to all whom it may concern that this was the last observation ever made by any one on board the ill-fated Esmeralda! The skipper checked me in the time, from the chronometer in the cabin; and when I had worked out the reckoning, we compared notes on the poop. "What do you make it?" said he. "56 degrees 20 minutes South," I said.
On the forty-third day from land, a long time to be at sea alone, the sky being beautifully clear and the moon being "in distance" with the sun, I threw up my sextant for sights. I found from the result of three observations, after long wrestling with lunar tables, that her longitude by observation agreed within five miles of that by dead-reckoning.
Food: 3 cases sledging rations = 300 rations. 2 cases nut food = 200 " 2 cases biscuits = 600 biscuits. 1 case lump sugar. 30 packets of Trumilk. 1 tin. of Bovril cubes. 1 tin of Cerebos salt. 36 gallons of water. 250 lbs. of ice. Instruments: Sextant. Sea-anchor. Binoculars. Charts. Prismatic compass. Aneroid.
To the invention of the chronometer must be added that of the reflecting sextant by Godfrey. This permitted astronomical observations to be made, notwithstanding the motion of a ship. Improvements in ocean navigation are exercising a powerful influence on the distribution of mankind. They are increasing the amount and altering the character of colonization.
Just before noon by the clocks, Lieutenant Baskirk appeared on the bridge, dressed in a brand-new uniform, with a sextant in his hands. Christy, who did not depend upon his pay for the extent of his wardrobe, had not less than three new suits, and he had presented one of them to the newly appointed officer, for there was no material difference in the size of the two persons.
Samuel got 150 pounds of bread, with a small quantity of rum and wine, also a quadrant and compass; but he was forbidden on pain of death to touch either map, ephemeris, book of astronomical observations, sextant, timekeeper, or any of my surveys or drawings.
The party being thus overpowered, the Malays took possession of their boat and immediately seized on all their property, a sextant, their log-book, some plate and clothes. They were themselves kept in a prow, without any covering, and exposed to the scorching heat of the sun, with an allowance of only a small quantity of sago during three days.
Leslie quite agreed as to the desirability of this, and he also cheerfully undertook to check and assist Purchas in his navigation. The latter therefore went below to make the necessary transfer, and presently returned to the deck, carrying Potter's sextant a very handsome and valuable instrument in his hand.
"But a good look-out must be kept ahead, for I know that there are numerous small islands and reefs, one of which may bring us up if we are not careful." The doctor assisted the midshipmen to search for a sextant and nautical almanack, but, to their surprise, neither were to be found.
His sextant, artificial horizon, thermometer, and compasses were carried apart. On the 11th of November, 1853, accompanied by the chief and his principal men to see him off, he left Linyanti, and embarked on the Chobe.
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