THE WINDS. 



269 



trades, tends to check these winds, and to draw in large volumes 

 of the atmosphere, that otherwise would be moved by them, 

 to supply the partial vacuum made by the heat of the sun, as it 

 pours down its rays upon the vast plains of burning sands and 

 unequally heated land-surfaces in our overheated hemisphere. 

 The northwest winds of the southern are also, it may be inferred, 

 stronger than the southwest winds of the northern hemisphere. 



769. " A ship leaving the English Channel to go to the equator 

 generally aims," says Jansen, *'to come too soon into the north- 

 east trade. The winds which prevail most, northward of the calm 

 belt of Cancer, are the southwest. Wind and weather in this part 

 of the Atlantic Ocean are very unreliable and changeable ; never- 

 theless, in the summer months, we find permanent north winds 

 along the coast of Portugal. These north winds are worthy of at- 

 tention, the more so from the fact that they occur simultaneously 

 with the African monsoon, and because we then find northerly 

 winds also in the ^Mediterranean, and in the Eed Sea, and farther 

 eastward to the north of the Indian monsoon. 



770. "When, between the months of May and November, during 

 which the African monsoon prevails, the Dutch ships, which have 

 lingered in the calm belt of Cancer, run with the northeast trade 

 and direct their course for the Cape Verd Islands, then it seems as 

 if they were in another world. The sombre skies and changeable — 

 alternately chilly and sultry — weather of our latitudes are replaced 

 by a regular temperature and good settled weather. Each one re- 

 joices in the glorious heavens, in which none save the little trade- 

 clouds are to be seen — which clouds in the trade- wind region make 

 the sunset so enchanting. The dark blue water, in which many 

 and strange kinds of echinas sport in the sunlight, and, when seen 

 at a distance, make the sea appear like one vast field adorned with 

 flowers ; the regular swellings of the waves with their silvery foam, 

 through which the flying-fishes flutter; the beautifully colored dol- 

 phins ; the diving schools of tunnies — all these banish afar the 

 monotony of the sea,* awake the love of life in the youthful sea- 



* When we, as our forefathers did, preserve in the journals all that we observe at 

 sea, then we shall have abundant material with which to keep ourselves pleasantly 

 occupied. 



