GULF STREAM, CLIMATES, AND COMMERCE, G3 



borders. Of all storms, the liurricanes of the West Indies and 

 the typhoons of the China seas cause the most ships to founder. 

 The stoutest men-of-war go down before them, and seldom, in- 

 deed, is any one of the crew left to tell the tale. Of this the 

 Hornet, the Albany, and the Grampus, armed cruisers in the 

 American navy, all are memorable and melancholy examples. 

 Our nautical works tell us of a AVest India hurricane so violent 

 that it forced the Gulf Stream back to its sources, and piled up 

 the water in the Gulf to the height of thirty feet. The Ledbury 

 Snow attempted to ride it out. AVhen it abated, she found her- 

 self high up on the dry land, and discovered that she had let go 

 her anchor among the tree-tops on Elliott's Key. The Florida- 

 Keys were inundated many feet, and, it is said, the scene pre- 

 sented in the Gulf Stream w^s never surpassed in awful sub- 

 limity on the ocean. The w^ater thus dammed up rushed out 

 with frightful velocity against the fury of the gale, producing a 

 sea that beggared description. The "great hurricane" of 1780 

 commenced in Barbadoes. In it the bark was blown from the 

 trees, and the fruits of the earth destroyed ; the very bottom and 

 depths of the sea were uprooted, and the waves rose to such a 

 height that forts and castles were washed away, and their great 

 guns carried about in the air like chaff; houses were razed ; 

 ships wrecked ; and the bodies of men and beasts lifted up in 

 the air and dashed to pie'ces in the storm. At the different 

 islands, not less than twenty thousand persons lost their lives 

 on shore, while farther to the north, the " Stirling Castle" and 

 the "Dover Castle," British men-of-war, w^ent do^vn at sea, and 

 fifty sail were driven on shore at the Bermudas. 



167. Inquiries instituted by the Admiralty. — Several years ago 

 the British Admiralty set on foot inquiries as to the cause of the 

 storms in certain parts of the Atlantic, which so often rage v^dth 

 disastrous effects to navigation. The result may be summed up 

 in the conclusion to which the investigation led : that they are 

 occasioned by the irregularity between the temperature of the 

 Gulf Stream and of the neighbouring regions, both in the air and 

 water. 



168. Tlie most stormy sea. — The southern points of South 

 America and Africa have won for themselves, among seamen, 

 the name of "the stormy capes ;" but investigations carried on 

 in that mine of sea-lore contained in the log-books at the National 

 Observatory at Washington, have shown that there is not a 



