76 REPORT — 1853. 



A Sketch of the Progress of Discovery in the Western Half of New Guinea, 

 from the Year 1828 tip to the Present Time. By G. Windsor Earl. 



This paper is a continuation of an essay on the same subject by Mr. Earl, which 

 appeared in the Transactions of the Geographical Society in 1837. In 1849 the 

 Dutch war- schooner Circe was sent by the Netherlands Government to explore the 

 north coast of New Guinea, for the purpose of choosing a site for another settlement. 

 Port Dory and the trading ports on the shores of the Great Bay were investigated ; after 

 which the Circe proceeded to the eastward along the coast, intending to examine 

 Port Humboldt, but contrary winds prevented her from entering the bay, after having 

 arrived within a few miles of the head. Nevertheless, the information collected was 

 considered sufficient to authorize the establishment of a settlement, and a garrison, 

 consisting of burghers, or native militia, was fixed there in the early part of 1852. 

 Mr. Earl is of opinion that this settlement is likely to prove useful to shipping em- 

 ployed in the traffic between India and the west coast of America, as the neighbour- 

 ing coast has hitherto afforded no place of refuge for distressed vessels, which is so 

 much the more necessary from the savage character of the inhabitants. The only 

 discovery of importance made during the voyage of the Circe was between Dobie 

 and the Arimoa Islands, where the low land, through an extent of nearly 100 miles, 

 was found to be the delta of a large river, called Ambermo by the natives, which, 

 from the immense quantity of alluvium that has been deposited' at its mouth, form- 

 ing a shallow bank, extending many miles out to sea, may be a river of importance, 

 affording access to the interior. Some mountains were seen far inland from the 

 mouth of the river, which were conjectured to be the same lofty range seen from 

 the south-west coast in 1828, and supposed, from their white appearance, to be 

 covered with snow. A lithographed sketch of this range, by one of the artists 

 attached to the Dutch Expedition of 1828, accompanied the paper. 



On the Currents of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. 

 By A.G. FiNDLAY, F.R.G.S. 



The progress of meteorological science having been pre-eminently fostered by the 

 British Association, it was thought that one hitherto much neglected, but very im- 

 portant branch of it, would form a fitting subject for their consideration. When it is 

 remembered that of the surface of our planet, the proportion of water to land is at 

 least 391 to 100, or nearly four times greater in area, and that the phaenomena of 

 the atmosphere must be exhibited much nearer their normal condition at sea than 

 on land, amid the infinite variety of terrestrial disturbances, the nature of oceanic 

 circulation must be allowed to be of no small importance in the generalization of 

 atmospheric phaenomena, and the distribution of climate. 



Yet this branch of natural science has had as yet but few votaries. The labours 

 of Lieut. Maury at the National Observatory of the United States have of late 

 drawn attention to it, and it is hoped that England may enter into an honourable 

 rivalry in this domain of science. It was, however, with deference urged that the 

 labours of our American brethren had not, as yet, added much to our knowledge of the 

 North Atlantic currents, as it was left to us by the personal labours of Major Rennell, 

 who gave us the first memoirs on the subject as it now stands in 1778 and 1793. 



It is with the currents of the North Atlantic only that we are tolerably intimate, 

 but even this knowledge is imperfect, for we know nothing of submarine or subsurface 

 currents, though such knowledge is greatly attainable. Of the other parts of the 

 wide world of waters we are in great ignorance, and it is in the Pacific, the Asiatic 

 Archipelago, and the Indian Ocean that the real harvest of maritime meteorology is 

 to be gained. 



There are several difficulties in the formation of an entire system from the labours 

 of Rennell ; the waters constantly setting into the Sargasso Sea, the origin and con- 

 tinuance of the North African and Guinea currents and of the Arctic currents are 

 not satisfactorily explained by him, but by analogy with the Pacific currents and 

 further observations, these anomalies may perhaps be removed. 



The Arctic current setting southward out of Baffin's Bay and between Iceland and 

 Greenland, passes down Labrador and Newfoundland, and turns to the westward in 

 soundings along the coast of the United States as far as Cape Hatteras, in opposition 

 to the direction of the Gulf-stream ; this was first explained by Mr. Redfield in 



