54 THE PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY OF THE SEA. 



him the result ; now he perceives that it is all one design ; that, 

 notwithstanding the number of parts, their diverse forms and va- 

 rious offices, and the agents concerned, the whole piece is of one 

 thought, the expression of one idea. He now perceives that when 

 the main-spring was fashioned and tempered, its relation to all the 

 other parts must have been considered ; that the cogs on this 

 wheel are cut and regulated — adapted — to the rachets on that, 

 &c. ; and his conclusion will be, that such a piece of mechanism 

 could not have been produced by chance ; the adaptation of the 

 parts is such as to show it to be according to design, and obedient 

 to the will of one intelligence. So, too, when one looks out upon 

 the face of this beautiful world, he may admire the lovely scene, 

 but his admiration can never grow into adoration unless he will 

 take the trouble to look behind and study, in some of its details 

 at least, the exquisite system of machinery by which such beauti- 

 ful results are accomplished. To him who does this, the sea, with 

 its physical geography, becomes as the main spring of a watch ; 

 its w^aters, and its currents, and its salts, and its inhabitants, with 

 their adaptations, as balance-w^heels, cogs and pinions, and jew- 

 els. Thus he perceives that they, too, are according to design ; 

 that they are the expression of One Thought, a unity with harmo- 

 nies which One Intelligence, and One Intelligence alone, could ut- 

 ter. And when he has arrived at this point, then he feels that the 

 study of the sea, in its physical aspect, is truly sublime. It ele- 

 vates the mind and ennobles the man. The Gulf Stream is now 

 no longer, therefore, to be regarded by such an one merely as an 

 immense current of w^arm water running across the ocean, but as 

 a balance-wheel — a part of that grand machinery by which air 

 and water are adapted to each other, and by which this earth 

 itself is adapted to the well-being of its inhabitants — of the flora 

 which deck, and the fauna which enliven its surface. 



69. Let us therefore consider the influence of the Gulf Stream 

 upon the meteorology of the ocean. 



To use a sailor expression, the Gulf Stream is the great " weath- 

 er breeder" of the North Atlantic Ocean. The most furious gales 

 of wind sweep along with it ; and the fogs of Newfoundland, 

 which so much endanger navigation in winter, doubtless owe their 

 existence to the presence, in that cold sea, of immense volumes 

 of warm water brought by the Gulf Stream. Sir Philip Brooke 



