As captain of Shearwater he carried out extensive surveying the Sea of Marmora and the Bosphorus, as well as in the Mediterranean and Indian Ocean.

In the Bosphorus he designed ingenious methods to measure the flow at different levels, showing currents and counter-currents.

He collaborated with David Gill on this work, who became a lifelong friend, and would later be Astronomer at the Cape of Good Hope.

In 1885, on the death of Sir Frederick Evans he was appointed to the Royal Society committee studying the effects of the eruption of Krakatoa in 1883.

He died of enteric fever at the age of 62 in David Gill's home in Cape Town.