384 Royal Society. 



charts of the winds and currents, and the sailing directions which 

 are formed upon them, corrected up to the latest period. 



Short as is the time that this system has been in operation, 

 the results to which it has led have proved of very great importance 

 to the interests of navigation and commerce. The routes to many 

 of the most frequented ports in different parts of the globe have 

 been materially shortened, that to St. Francisco in California by 

 nearly one third : a system of southwardly monsoons in the equato- 

 rial regions of the Atlantic and on the west coast of America has 

 been discovered ; a vibratory motion of the trade-wind zones, and 

 with their belts of calms and their limits for every month of the 

 year, has been determined : the course, bifurcations, limits and other 

 phenomena of the Great Gulf-stream have been more accurately 

 defined, and the existence of almost equally remarkable systems of 

 currents in the Indian Ocean, on the coast of China, and on the 

 North-western coast of America and elsewhere has been ascertained : 

 there are, in fact, very few departments of the science of meteorology 

 and hydrography wdiich have not received very valuable additions ; 

 whilst the more accurate determination of the parts of the Pacific 

 Ocean, where the sperm-whale is found (which are very limited iir 

 extent), as well as the limits of the range of those of other sjiecies, 

 has contributed very materially to the success of the American 

 whale fishery, one of the most extensive and productive of all their 

 fields of enterprise and industr}-. 



The success of this system of cooperative observations has 

 already led to the establishment of societies at Bombay and Calcutta, 

 for obtaining, by similar means, a better knowledge of the winds, 

 currents, and the course of the streams of the Indian seas. 



But it is to the government of this country that the demand 

 for cooperation, and for the interchange of observations, is most 

 earnestly addressed by the government of the United States ; and 

 the President and Council of the Royal Society express their hope 

 that it w'ill not be addressed in vain. We possess in our ships 

 of war, in our packet service and in our vast commercial navy, 

 better means of making such observations, and a greater interest in 

 the results to M-hich they lead, than any other nation. For this pur- 

 pose, every ship which is under the control of the Admiralty should 

 be furnished with instruments properly constructed and compared, 

 and with proper instructions for using them : similar instructions 

 for making and recording observations, as far as their means will 

 allow, should be sent to every ship that sails, with a request that 

 the results of them be transmitted to the Hydrographer's Office of the 

 Admiralty, where an adequate staff of officers or others should be 

 provided for their prompt examination, and the publication of the 

 improved charts and sailing directions to which they would lead ; 

 above all, it seems desirable to establish a prompt communication 

 with the Hydrogi-apher's Office of the United States, so that the 

 united labours of the two greatest naval and commercial nations of 

 the world may be combined, with the least practicable delay, in 

 promoting the interests of navigation. 



