THE WINDS OF THE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE. 449 



seqiiently the oblateness of the atmosj^herical covering of our 

 planet will be altered ; the flattening about the poles will be 

 relieved by the intumescence of the expanded and ascending air, 

 which, protruding above the general level of the aerial ocean, 

 will receive an impulse equatorially, as well from the mere de- 

 rangement of equilibrium as from the centrifugal forces of tho 

 revolving globe. And so this air, having parted with its 

 moisture, and having received the expansive force of all the 

 latent heat evolved in the process of vaporous condensation, will 

 commence its return towards the equator as an upper current of 

 diy air. 



836. A perpetual cyclone. — Arrived at this point of the investi- 

 gation, we may contemplate the whole system of these " brave 

 west winds " in the light of an everlasting cyclone on a gigantic 

 scale. The antarctic continent is in its vortex, about which tho 

 wind, in the great atmospherical ocean all around the world, 

 from the pole to the edge of the calm belt of Capricorn, is re- 

 volving in spiral curves, continually going with the hands of a 

 watch, and twisting from left to right. 



837. Discovery of design in the meteorological machinery. — In 

 studying the workings of the various parts of the physical 

 machinery that surrounds our planet, it is always refreshing 

 and profitable to detect, even by glimmerings never so faint, 

 the slightest tracings of the purpose which the Omnipotent 

 Architect of the universe designed to accomplish by any 

 particular arrangement among its various parts. Thus it is 

 in this instance : whether the train of reasoning which we 

 have been endeavouring to follow up, or whether the argu- 

 ments which we have been adducing to sustain it be entirely 

 correct or not, we may, from all the facts and circumstances 

 that we have passed in review, find reasons sufficient for regard- 

 ing in an instructive, if not in a new light, that vast waste of 

 waters which surrounds the unexplored regions of the antarctic 

 circle. It is a reservoir of dynamical force for the winds — a re- 

 gulator in the grand meteorological machinery of the earth. The 

 heat which is transported by the vapours with which that sea 

 loads its superincumbent air is the chief source of the motive 

 power which gives to the winds of the southern hemisphere, as 

 they move through their channels of circulation, their high speed, 

 great regularity, and consistency of volume. And this insight 

 into the workings of the wonderful machineiy of sea and air wo 



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