Correspondence and papers of Edmond Halley : preceded by an unpublished memoir of his life by one of his contemporaries and the 'Éloge' / by D'Ortous de Mairan; arranged and edited by Eugene Fairfield MacPike.

  • Edmond Halley
Date:
[1937]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Correspondence and papers of Edmond Halley : preceded by an unpublished memoir of his life by one of his contemporaries and the 'Éloge' / by D'Ortous de Mairan; arranged and edited by Eugene Fairfield MacPike. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    opportunitys of being inform'd by his entertaining] and in¬ structing Conversation.1 In 1698 the King, who had been inform'd of Mr. Halley's ingenious Theory of the Magnetic Needle, was desireous the varia¬ tion shou’d, for the Benefit of Navigation, be carefully observed, in diverse parts of the great Atlantic Ocean; for which purpose His Majesty, the 19th Aug. 1698, appointed Mr. Halley Commander of his Ship the Paramoor Pink,2 with orders3 to seek by observation the discovery 0} the Rule of the variation 0} the Compass, and at the same time to call at his Majestys Settlements in America, and make some observations there, in order to the better laying down the Longitudes and Latitudes of those places, and to attempt a discovery of what Lands lay to the South of the Western Ocean; for which purpose Mr. Halley set out on the 24th of the following October: But when he had already pass’d the Line, some Accidents that happen’d on board, and a mutiny caused by his Lieutenant, obliged him to return much sooner than was intended, and he arrived again in England the latter end of June 1699; from whence after the Trial of his Lieutenant,4 who was broken and dismiss'd the Kings Service, he again set out the 16 of September following, with the same Ship and another lesser, both under his command; and having observed in many places of the Atlantick Ocean, and advanced as far to the Southward as the Ice would permit, he toucht at The Canaries, Madera, and Cape Yerd Islands, at St. Helena, the Coast of Brazile, Barbadoes, and several other places, according to his Instructions, and return’d to England the 7 Septr. 1700. In which whole Voyage, he has told me, he was attended with a particular piece of good Fortune, which was, that, tho’ he in that time 4 times crosst the Line, and went directly from thence into the cold Climates of the South, he lost not one Man,5 but brought home every Soul with him he Carryed out, in good health ;6 a par- 1 Halley, it has been stated, ‘spoke German fluently’ in his conversations with Peter the Great, in 1698; yet the latter is said to have understood only Russian and Dutch ! 2 The recorded ‘Commission for Mr. Edmund Halley to be Master and Commander of his Maty. Pink the Paramour, dated the 19 day Aug. ’98’ is preserved in the Admiralty Archives, in the Public Record Office, London. 3 See Appendix XI. 4 See ‘Correspondence’,p. 107. (Cf. Bellamy, F. A.: Knowledge, vol. xxxiii, p. 168, London, 1910.) 5 ‘However, this happiness was dashed with the misfortune of losing a favourite boy, who by some unlucky accident was thrown overboard and drowned, and the captain was so deeply affected with the loss that during his whole life afterwards he never mentioned it without tears’ (Blog. Brit., vol. iv, p. 2502, note [o]). 6 If Halley ‘brought home every Soul with him he Carryed out’, one must infer that the ‘favourite boy’ was taken aboard ship by Halley, at some place on his voyages. We have no evidence of this. (See Appendix XII.)
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