20 : The Atlantic 



ognizes that some of our older attempts to name and separate bod- 

 ies of water while arbitrary and unimportant still had a certain con- 

 venience. In fact the scientists themselves still use expressions like 

 "North Atlantic" and "South Atlantic" because these are convenient 

 to describe geographical areas and the conditions found therein. They 

 would insist, however, that the North and South Atlantic are not 

 independent oceans but interdependent parts of the same ocean, with 

 the South Adantic at one level sending great masses of water into 

 the Caribbean and so into the North Atlantic balanced by receiving 

 waters coming directly from the North Atlantic at another level. 



Science and common sense agree that an ocean means the main 

 body of water together with all of its adjacent seas, gulfs, sounds, etc. 

 There are a number of reasons for this usage including the follow- 

 ing: First, it is sometimes difficult to tell where a sea leaves off and 

 an ocean begins. Second, because there is in nearly all cases a free and 

 continual exchange of large volumes of water between adjacent seas 

 and the ocean itself. This introduces a third reason because while the 

 ocean affects the adjacent sea, the adjacent sea also in some degree 

 affects the character of the ocean. Finally, because the value of an 

 ocean in great measure depends upon these lesser waters which are 

 so important not only to the plant and animal life of the ocean but 

 also to the life of man. 



The Atlantic Ocean, then, consists of a large diversified and intricate 

 system of salt water almost entirely surrounded by the land of six 

 continents including Antarctica. The land margins of the Atlantic 

 begin in the southeast quarter of the ocean at the Cape of Good Hope 

 and include all the west coast of Africa. Then, in the Mediterranean, 

 the north coast of Africa, Asia Minor and Turkey, the margins of the 

 Black Sea, the southern coast of Europe, and in the Adantic once 

 more, the western shore of Europe from the Straits of Gibraltar to 

 the North Cape, then the north coast of Europe and Asia as far as Be- 

 ring Strait. 



Bering Strait as a matter of fact constitutes but a narrow rift in the 

 continental bulwarks of the Atlantic. As we shall see later in greater 

 detail, Bering Strait is not only narrow but also shallow and the vol- 

 ume of water flowing over the sill inconsequential from the point of 

 view of the oceanic system. 



The boundary then becomes the northern shore of Alaska and 

 Canada including the extensive indentation at Hudson Bay, Labrador 

 and the eastern shore of Canada, the eastern shore of the United 

 States into the Gulf of Mexico and the irregular contours of Central 



