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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[DECEMBER, 1899.
the danger which, with proper attention to the Land, will apprize ships of their danger before they approach it too close. The Ledge is situated in Latitude 11° 0' 7" N. and bears from the South end of the Great Andaman E. 16° S. distant 17 Leagues. It is of small extent with high Breakers on it, and some parts are Visible after the Surfs.
Your Lordship's Commands relating to the Andamans being executed, our stock being exhausted and several of the people having disorders (contracted at Calcutta) which required assistance, I determined to proceed immediately for this Island, and arrived here the 3rd Instant. I have now the satisfaction to inform Your Lordship that the Major part of our sick will be fit for duty again in a few days, when I shall proceed directly for Acheen in order to examine sidoo Harbour, and another a little to the Southward of it, which Mr. Light bas informed me of. He is also to give me a Letter to the King of Acheen, which I have no doubt will procure me Permission to make the necessary examination.
By the middle or end of June I expect to quit the Coast of Sumatra and to arrive at Calcutta in July, when I shall have the honour of laying before Your Lordship, a more detailed account of the service with particular Plans of the Harbours and a General Chart of the whole Survey.
I have, etc., (Sd.) Archibald Blair.
No. II. Henry Dundas to w. w. Grenville, 1790, August 19. Donira Lodge. “Mr. Robert Blair, who writes the enclosed, is professor of practical astronomy in the University of Edinburgh, and perhaps one of the most ingenious men and best philosophers you ever knew. The letter he sends to me is from his brother, the officer who you will recollect to have been employed in the survey of the Andaman harbour, concerning which we entertain such sanguine expectations. The letter is proper for your perural in every point of view, but
I send it on account of what is stated respecting the opinion of Commodore Cornwallis. It is more recent than any thing I have seen. Perhaps there is more recent at the Admiralty or your Office, but nothing official has reached me of so late a date on the subject."
2 Enclosures :Number 1. - Robert Blair to Henry Dundas 1700, August 8.
Great Russell Street, Bloomsbury. "I should still have delayed writing, if it were not for a letter which I have just received rom my brother, and which I use the freedom of enclosing, as it may possibly contain some farther information concerning an object, about whose importance such sanguine hopes are, and I hope justly, entertained. As I know how readily you will overlook any impropriety in giving a hint on a subject of which you are so much better a judge, I shall also venture to mention a thought which occurred to me on reading Archibald's letter,
“I have heard through a friend, who has long corresponded with Lieutenant Mears, that a proposal has been made to Government to send the convicts to one of the Sandwich Islands (which I believe the Lieutenant has purchased from the Natives) instead of sending them to New Holland.
"Might they not be conveyed at much less expence, and turned to much better account, if sent to colonise Chatham Island P The supply of Europeans which would thus be at hand, to recruit our military and naval armamente in India, seems alone to be an object of great magnitude. The limited extent of the island, its proximity to the seat of Government, and the military force and fortifications necessary, at any rate, to protect the harbour, would effectually prevent their ever becoming troublesome. But I have said more than enough on a subject, which, if worth attending to must have already occurred to you."
In the Goul. Chart the South extreme is named Rutland Island.
