CHAP. VIII. } THE GULF-STREAM. 8379 
“So, after all, there is an under-current setting outwards in 
the Straits of Gibraltar. 
“Repeating my thanks for this interesting memoir, believe 
me, dear Sir, 
“Yours very truly, 
“J. F. W. HERSCHEL. 
*< Dr. W. B. Carpenter.” } 
The second view, supported by Dr. Petermann of 
Gotha, and by most of the leading authorities in 
physical geography in Germany and Northern 
Europe, and strongly urged by the late Sir John 
Herschel in his ‘Outlines of Physical Geography,’ 
published in the year 1846, attributes nearly the 
whole of the sensible phenomena of heat-distribution 
in the North Atlantic to the Gulf-stream, and to the 
arctic return-currents which are induced by the 
removal of tropical water towards the polar regions 
by the Gulf-stream. If we for a moment admit that 
to the Gulf-stream is due almost exclusively the 
singular advantage in climate which the eastern 
borders of the North Atlantic possess over the 
western, the origin of this great current, its extent 
and direction, and the nature and amount of its 
influence, become questions of surpassing interest. 
Before considering these, however, it will be well 
to define what is here meant by the term ‘Gulf- 
stream,’ for even on this point there has been a good 
deal of misconception. 
I mean by the Gulf-stream that mass of heated 
water which pours from the Strait of Florida across 
the North Atlantic, and likewise a wider but less 
definite warm current, evidently forming part of the 
same great movement of water, which curves north- 
1 Nature, vol. iv. p. 71. 
