Additional Objections to Redfield's Theory of Storms. 93 



is the effect of a vortical or gyratory action *, when it must 

 be quite plain that a " vortical" action or whirling motion in- 

 stead of causing the air upon the terrestrial surface, necessarily 

 subjected by it to a centrifugal force, to seek the centre, would 

 induce that portion of the atmosphere which should be above 

 the sphere of the gyration, to descend into the central space 

 rarefied by the centrifugal force. 



57. In admitting the gyration, which he considers as the 

 cause of storms, to quicken as it approaches the axis of mo- 

 tion, without perceiving that this characteristic is irreconcilable 

 with his inference that gyration caused by forces acting re- 

 motely from the axis is the proximate cause of all the phseno- 

 mena in question. 



58. In the number of Silliman's Journal of Science for 

 April, 1842, Mr. Redfield has hinted that the pains which 

 I have taken to confute his doctrines are disproportioned to 

 the low estimation in which I have professed to hold them. 

 I should be glad if this view of the subject should render my 

 strictures agreeable to him ; and am sincerely sorry that, con- 

 sistently with truth, I cannot directly take a course more fa- 

 vourable to his meteorological infallibility. I admit that his 

 essays have met with an attention which may have justified him 

 in pluming himself on their success. Had it been otherwise, 

 I should not have thought it worth while to enter the lists. It 

 strikes me, however, that a fault now prevails which is the 

 opposite of that which Bacon has been applauded for correcting. 

 Instead of the extreme of entertaining plausible theories having 

 no adequate foundation in observation or experiment, some 

 men of science of the present time are prone to lend a favour- 

 able ear to any hypothesis, however in itself absurd, provided 

 it be associated with observations. But to proceed with the 

 " reply," so called, the author alleges that in the absence of 

 " reliable facts and observations" in support of my objections 

 to what he considers as the " established character of storms," 

 he had hesitated to answer them. This cannot excite sur- 

 prise, when it is recollected " that the whole modern mete- 

 orological school," and likewise " Sir John Herschel," are ac- 

 cused by him of a " grand error," in not ascribing all atmo- 

 spheric winds " solely to the gravitating power as connected 

 with the rotary and orbitual motion of the earth." 



59. For this denunciation he has no better ground than that 

 on which he deems his theory to be above my reach, that is 

 to say, because himself and others have made some observa- 

 tions showing that in certain storms, agreeably to log-book 

 records, certain ships have had the wind in a way to indicate 



* See paragraph 92 of this communication. 



