some Points on the West Coast of Scotland. 307 



fore appears that till the application of the scientific societies of 

 Scotland in the summer of 1837, the application of the British 

 Association for at least the immediate resumption of the Survey 

 had been unsuccessful. The benefits, however, that will now 

 be conferred on the country must be great and permanent. 

 The speculations of geologists will likely be more consistent 

 with regard to localities, dips, and directions of mountain- 

 ranges, the views of the agriculturist, as connected with drain- 

 age, &c., better founded, and the prospects of the mercantile 

 interest more secure. 



Observations on the Hurricanes and Storms of the West Indies 

 and the Coast of the United States. By W. C. Redfield, 

 Esq. "With a Chart.* 



From a careful attention to the progress and phenomena of 

 some of the more violent storms which have visited the Wes- 

 tern Atlantic, I have found that they exhibit certain charac- 

 teristics of great uniformity. This appears, not only in the 

 determinate course which these storms are found to pursue, 

 but in the direction of wind, and succession of changes which 

 they exhibit while they continue in action. The same general 

 characteristics appear also to pertain, in some degree, to many 

 of the more common variations and vicissitudes of winds and. 

 weather, at least in the temperate latitudes. The following 

 points I consider as established : 



1. The storms of greatest severity often originate in the tro- 

 pical latitudes, and, not unfrequently, to the eastwai'd of the 

 West India Islands ; in the tropical regions they are distin- 

 guished by the name of hurricanes. 



" In the 18th Volume of this Journal we published a short account of Mf 

 Redfield's " Observations on the Hurricanes and Storms of the West Indies 

 and the Coast of the United States," being convinced his statements were 

 deserving the particular attention of Meteorologists and Mariners. It is but 

 lately, however, that his views have been particularly noticed in this coun* 

 try. Mrs Somerville, Professor Daubeny, and other writers, have mentioned 

 them with approbation, and therefore, we presume, we are consulting the 

 wishes of our readers by laying before them this more extended memoir of 

 Mr Redfield. 



