244 THE PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY OF THE SEA. 



CHAPTER XV. 



THE DRIFT OF THE SEA. 



Object of Plate IX., <$> 528. — The Eastern Edge of the Gulf Stream sometimes visi- 

 ble, 529.— The Polar Drift about Cape Horn, 533.— How the Polar Waters drift 

 into the South Atlantic, and force the Equatorial aside, 535. — How this is accom- 

 pliohed, 537. — A Harbor in a Bend of the Gulf Stream for Icebergs, 539. — Why 

 Icebergs are not found in the North Pacific, 540. — The Womb of the Sea, 541. — 

 Drift of warm Waters out of the Indian Ocean, 543. — A Suggestion from Lieu- 

 tenant Jansen, of the Dutch Navy, 544. — A Current of warm Water sixteen hund- 

 red Miles wide, 545. — The Pulse of the Sea, 546. — How the Gulf Stream beats 

 ■ Time, 547.— The Circulation of the Sea likened to that of the Blood, 548.— The 

 Fish : Number of Vessels engaged in the Fisheries of the Sea, 551. — The Sperm 

 Whale delights in warm Water, 552. — The Torrid Zone impassable to the Right 

 WTjale, 553. 



526. There is a movement of the waters of the ocean which, 

 though it be a translation, yet does not amount to what is known 

 to the mariner as current, for our nautical instruments and the art 

 of navigation have not been brought to that state of perfection 

 which will enable navigators generally to detect as currents the 

 flow to which I allude as drift. 



527. If we imagine an object to be set adrift in the ocean at the 

 equator, and if we suppose that it be of such a nature that it would 

 obey only the influence of sea water, and not of the winds, this 

 object, I imagine, would, in the course of time, find its way to the 

 icy barriers about the poles, and again back among the tepid wa- 

 ters of the tropics. Such an object would illustrate the drift of 

 the sea, and by its course w-ould indicate the route which the sur- 

 face waters of the sea follow in their general channels of circula- 

 tion to and fro between the equator and the poles. 



528. The object of Plate IX., therefore, is to illustrate, as far 

 as the present state of my researches enables me to do, the cir- 

 culation of the ocean, as influenced by heat and cold, and to in- 

 dicate the routes by which the overheated waters of the torrid 

 zone escape to cooler regions, on one hand, and on the other, the 

 great channel ways through which the same waters, after having 



