THE DRIFT OF THE SEA. 31 X 



cold water into the South Atlantic appears to divide the warm 

 water, and squeeze it out at the sides, along the coasts of South 

 Africa and Brazil. So, too, in the North Indian Ocean, the cold 

 water again compelling the warm to escape along the land at the 

 sides, as well as occasionally in the middle. 



899. In the North Atlantic and North Pacific, on the contrary, 

 the warm water appears to divide the cold, and to squeeze it oi.t 

 along the land at the sides. The impression made by the cold 

 current from Baffin's Bay upon the Gulf Stream is strikingly 

 beautiful. 



900. Why is it that these polar and equatorial waters shouli 

 appear now to divide and now to be divided ? The Gulf Streani 

 has revealed to us a fact in which the answer is involved. We 

 learn from that stream that cold and warm sea waters are, in a 

 measure (§ 28), like oil and vinegar ; that is, there is among the 

 particles of sea water at a high temperature, and among the par- 

 ticles of sea water at a low temperature, a peculiar molecular ar- 

 rangement that is antagonistic to the free mixing up of cold and 

 liot together. At any rate, that salt waters of different tempera- 

 tures do not readily intermingle at sea is obvious. 



901. Does not this same repugnance exist, at least in degree, 

 between these bodies of cold and warm water of the plate ? And 

 if so, does not the phenomenon we are considering resolve itself 

 into a question of masses ? The volume of warm water in the 

 North Atlantic is greater than the volume of cold water that meets 

 and opposes it ; consequently, the warm thrusts the cold aside, di- 

 viding and compelling it to go round. The same thing is repeat- 

 ed in the North Pacific, whereas the converse obtains in the South 

 Atlantic. Here the great polar flow, after having been divided by 

 the American Continent, enters.the Atlantic, and filling up nearly 

 the whole of the immense space between South America and Af- 

 rica, seems to press the warm waters of the tropics aside, compell- 

 ing them to drift along the coast on either hand. 



902. Another feature of the sea expressed by this plate is a sort 

 of reflection or recast of the shore-line in the temperature of the 

 water. This feature is most striking in the North Pacific and In- 

 dian Ocean. The remarkable intrusion of the cool into the volume 



