Dr Forry on the Climate of the United States. 95 



an immense furnace, distributes its heat to Arabia, to Turkey 

 in Asia, and to Europe." On the contrary, the north-east- 

 ern extremity of Asia, which extends between the 60th and 

 70th parallel, and is bounded on the south by water, expe- 

 riences extreme cold in corresponding latitudes. 



Another cause contributing to the same effect is the Gulf 

 Stream, the warm air arising from which being wafted by 

 the westerly winds mainly to the shores of Europe. But 

 independent of the v/esterly winds, which transport the 

 tempered atmosphere of the Pacific over the land, and con- 

 versely, in traversing the continent, bear upon their Avings 

 the accumulating cold towards our eastern shores, we ob- 

 serve, in attempting to account for the extraordinary dissi- 

 militude in the climate of our two coasts, on the eastern side 

 an unascertained prolongation of the continent towards the 

 pole, and an oceanic current sweeping immense masses of ice 

 southwardly ; while on the western side the great range of 

 Rocky Mountains shelters Oregon from the polar winds, and 

 the projecting mass of Russian America protects it from the 

 polar ice. 



Connected with this subject is the question frequently 

 agitated, whether the old continent is warmer than the new. 

 Volney and others have attempted its solution by a compa- 

 rison of the mean annual temperatures of different places on 

 both sides of the Atlantic ; but to this mode of determining 

 it, the objection at once presents itself, that the points of 

 comparison represent opposite extremes in the climate of 

 each continent. Indeed, the question in itself involves an 

 absurditj' ; for as the laws of nature are unvarying in their 

 operation, and as similar physical conditions obtain in cor- 

 responding parallels of both continents, the sam-e meteorolo- 

 gical phenomena Mall be induced. It shews in lively colours 

 the trutli of the remark, that every physical science beai's 

 the impress of the place at which it received earliest culti- 

 vation. In geology, for example, all vblcanic phenomena 

 were long referred to those of Italy ; and in meteorology, 

 the climate of P^urope has been assumed as the type by which 

 to estimate that of all corresponding latitudes. In making 

 a comparison of the two continents, it is, therefore, neces- 



