THE SEA AND THE ATMOSPHERE. 7 



latent form with the vapours from the southern seas ; — 2. by the 

 transfer of heat in the sensible form, by currents such as the 

 Gulf Stream, et al., from one climate to another in our hemi- 

 sphere. Hence we infer that the southern hemisphere is in 

 certain zones cooler than the northern, not by reason of its slioii: 

 summer or long winter, but it is the cooler chiefly on account of 

 the latent heat which is brought thence by vapour, and set free 

 here by condensation. 



21. England about the i^ole of hemisj^here imtli most land. — Within 

 the torrid zone the land is nearly equally divided north and 

 south of the equator, the proportion being as 5 to 4. In the 

 temperate zones, however, the north with its land is thirteen 

 times in excess of the south. Indeed, such is the inequality 

 in the distribution of land over the surface of the globe that the 

 world may be divided into hemispheres consisting, the one with 

 almost all the land in it, except Australia and a slip of America 

 lying south of a line drawn from the desert of Atacama to 

 Uruguay; England is the centre of this, the dry hemisphere. 

 The other, or aqueous hemisphere, contains all the great waters 

 except the Atlantic Ocean; Kew Zealand is the nearest land 

 to its centre. 



22. Effects of inequality in distribution of land and water. — This 

 unequal distribution of land, light, air, and water is suggestive. 

 To it we owe, in a measure, the different climates of the earth. 

 AVere it different, they would be different also ; were it not for 

 the winds, the vapours that rise from the sea would from the 

 clouds be returned in showers back to the places in the sea 

 whence they came ; on an earth where no winds bloAv we should 

 have neither green pastures, still waters, nor running brooks 

 to beautify the landscape. Were there no currents in the sea, 

 nor vertical movements in the air, the seasons might change, 

 but climates would be a simple affair, depending solely on the 

 declination of the sun in the sky. 



23. Quantity of fresh water in American lakes. — About two-thirds 

 of all the fresh water on the surface of the earth is contained 

 in the great American lakes; and though there be in the 

 northern, as compared with the southern hemisphere, so much 

 less sea surface to yield vapour, so much more land to swallow 

 up rain, and so many more plants to drink it in, yet the fresh- 

 water courses are far more numerous and copious on the north 

 than they are on the south side of the equator. 



