PHYSICAL OCEANOGRAPHY 299 



65 and 67. Now, when we consider the position of the 

 water-layers and the effect of the earth's rotation, as treated 

 above (p. 276), we come to the following conclusion : the 

 current in the upper water-layers sets towards the north-east 

 between Stations 65 and 66, another current runs tow.ards the 

 south-west between Stations 66 and 67, then a current runs to 

 the north-east again towards Station 70. 



As we were working at Station 67 on the afternoon of the 

 27th June, a gale arose, increasing in the course of the night 

 to a hurricane from the south-west, veering later on to the 

 west. There was a rough sea with choppy waves, as is usual 

 with the wind blowing against the current. We kept the 

 ship's head to the wind all night, and it was as much as we 

 could do under heavy steam pressure to stem the storm with- 

 out drifting off. Next morning the wind fell somewhat ; it was 

 fresh from the west when we occupied Station 68. When the 

 captain got an observation, it proved that we had been carried 

 southwards about fifty nautical miles from Station 67 to 

 Station 68. This agrees excellently with our conclusions from 

 the distribution of temperature and salinity, and it is established 

 beyond doubt that in this place there was a strong current 

 running towards the south-west. The west wind caused the 

 ship to drift more to the south than the course of the current. 

 Peake and Murray^ and Schott tell us that a current running 

 south-west has been met with before in the same region ; thus, 

 the cable - steamer " Podbielski," in May 1902, drifted 53 



1 " The climate of the British Isles being influenced to such a large extent by the warm water ot 

 the Gulf Stream, the movements of this great body of water, the course of its main current, and 

 the manner in which this spreads itself over a very large portion of the North Atlantic, should 

 be a subject of special interest to the inhabitants of these islands. Among those who have not 

 carefully studied the observations that have been made on this subject, a general impression 

 obtains that after leaving the American coast the Gulf Stream consists of a body of warm water 

 moving steadily across the North Atlantic in the direction of the Irish coast. An increasing 

 number of observations tend more and more to show that this is not the case ; the movement of 

 this great mass of water is more probably somewhat in the form of bands of current which 

 curve and recurve on one another, forming swirls of large area whose strength and direction 

 change almost daily. A glance at the current charts shows how the Gulf Stream in its passage 

 across the Atlantic spreads itself out at the surface like a fan, and forms what is known as the 

 Gulf Stream drift. 



" It will also be noticed that on the line of observation given herewith, an easterly current was 

 met with considerably farther to the westward than would have been expected from the 

 Admiralty current charts ; this, however, merely exemplifies the variations which occur in the 

 course of even the main body of the stream at the surface, the course as shown on the Admiralty 

 current charts being its average direction. 



" In the appended list of observations the total ' sets ' are given, and these are again corrected 

 for the pressure of the wind and the force of the sea, leaving a ' set ' due to current only. 

 The correction for wind and sea is necessarily only an approximation, but the result approaches 

 more nearly to the current effect than would have been the case had no correction been 

 attempted. The direction of the current as observed between the Azores and North America 

 is shown on the accompanying map by arrows " (Peake and Murray, " On the Results of a Deep- 

 Sea Sounding Expedition in the North Atlantic during the Summer of 1899," extra publication of 

 the Roy. Geog. Soc. London, 1901, pp. 13-14). 



