 Once on station she made lines of soundings in Esperance Bay, Fiji and the Tasman Peninsula in preparation for the running of telegraph cables.Between 1898 and 1907 she worked the coast of China, including Hong Kong, Weihaiwei and the Yangtze River.In early 1900 Commander Willoughby Pudsey Dawson was in command, succeeded by Lieutenant W. O. Lyne when she was re-commissioned on 16 February 1900.