178 FOUNDERS OF OCEANOGRAPHY 



researches give hope that we may be able to predict winter 

 temperatures in advance from observations on the tempera- 

 tures of the sea. A fuller knowledge of the ocean currents 

 ought to enable us to predict not merely the weather in 

 general, but such details as the distribution of ice in the 

 North Atlantic and the prospects of sea-fisheries for perhaps 

 a year in advance. 



The oceans of the globe perform a great equalizing function. 

 All the movements of the sea are ultimately due to solar 

 energy. The sea distributes the heat of the sun, conveying 

 about haK of that received in the tropics to higher latitudes, 

 and it also tempers tropical climates by means of cold 

 currents from the polar regions. By interchange of carbon 

 dioxide with the overlying air it helps to maintain a uniform 

 composition in the atmosphere, and by its slow changes of 

 temperature it to some extent regulates climates. It 

 supplies water -vapour to the atmosphere and rain for the 

 land. It receives and redistributes materials from the 

 land and maintains a huge population of organisms which 

 form an all-important part of the cycle of organic and 

 inorganic nature. 



The Tile -Fish 



A very striking case of the possible influence of the 

 occasional shifting of warm and cold currents upon the 

 population of a portion of the sea is seen in the discovery 

 and subsequent disappearance of the tile-fish in the North 

 American Gulf Stream area. 



A new and valuable food-fish was found off the coast of 

 New England, between Cape Hatteras and Nantucket, in 

 1879, and was described under the name of *' Tile-fish '* 

 (Lopholatilus chamceleonticeps). (See Plate XVIII, Fig. 1.) 

 It is about the size of a cod, weighing up to about 60 

 lb., and occurred in great abundance at depths of from 

 50 to 100 fathoms, at 80 to 100 miles from the coast. 

 For a couple of years it was fished by the cod-fishery 



