revalent from south-south-east to east-north-east;
coming more from the land at night, and from the sea in the day time.
They seldom had any strength; whereas the winds which occasionally blew
from the westward were fresh, and sometimes became gales, veering in that
case, invariably to the south-west.

On reaching Cape Northumberland I again found the eastwardly current; and
from thence into Bass' Strait it ran N. 80 deg. E., at the rate of twelve
miles a day, the wind blowing strong from the south-westward in the
latter part of the time.

In a subsequent run across the Great Bight in May, from the Archipelago
nearly direct for Bass' Strait, the current set upon the average, N. 39 deg.
E. fourteen miles a day; appearing to be much influenced in its northern
direction by the winds blowing strong from the southward. Mr. Dalrymple,
in reasoning from the analogy of southern Africa, expected that the winds
upon this coast would be found to blow from the northward, or off the
shore, _in the winter time_, and this might possibly be the case if close
in with the land; but at a distance from it, as just observed, the winds
were from the southward.

Such an accumulation of water forcing itself through Bass' Strait, would
naturally lead to the expectation of finding a strong current there,
setting to the east; but on the contrary, the set in common cases was
found to be rather in the opposite direction, the current appearing to be
predominated by the tides, whose superior strength forced it below the
surface. The flood comes from the eastward; and after making high water
at Furneaux's Isles, passes on to Hunter's and King's Islands, where it
meets another flood from the southward; and the high water then made
seems to be nearly at the time that it is low water at Furneaux's Isles.
Another flood is then coming from the east, and so on; whence a ship
going eastward through the Strait, will have more tide meeting than
setting after her, and be commonly astern of her reckoning. This applies
more especially to the middle of the strait, and is what I there found
with winds blowing across it; but the bight on the north side, between
Cape Otway and Wilson's Promontory, seems to be an exception, and in
fact, it lies out of the direct set of the tides. In running from Port
Phillip to the Promontory I was set S. 73 deg. E., thirty-five miles in the
day; but it then blew a gale from the west and south-westward.

Although the eastwardly cur