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them ; while the works of the late Sir W. Reid [REID, SIR WILLIAM, 

 iu Biof,. Div.], especially that entitled ' An Attempt to develope the 

 Law of Storms,' contain almost all that is known of the whirlwinds 

 in the southern hemisphere. 



In the ' American Journal of Science,' vol. xx., it is shown that the 

 storm which took place in September, 1821, began in the West Indies, 

 .mil arrived off the coast of the United States, in lat. 35 N., at clay- 

 light, September 3rd, when the wind blew from E.S.E. On the same 



l . 1 1 A.M., the storm commenced at Cape Henlopen, with the wind 

 in the game quarter, but it afterwards shifted to E.N.E., and blew 

 iluring nearly an hour : a calm of half an hour succeeded, when the 

 ind shifted to W.N.W.. and blew with great violence. At New York 

 the storm commenced at 5 P.M., from E. and N.E., the wind blowing 

 with fury for three hours, and then it changed to W. At Boston the 

 hurricane commenced at 10 P.M., but beyond this city it was not 

 traced. All the phenomena just mentioned indicate, agreeably to the 

 principles above explained, a revolving hurricane iu which the direction 

 of the rotation was according to the order of the cardinal points, N., 

 W.. S., E., while the progressive movement of the axis was about N. 

 " l>y E. The temporary calm at Cape Henlopen seems to show that the 

 centre of the vortex was then near that place. 



In the same work it is stated that, during the hurricane of 1830, at 

 the Bahama Islands, the wind veered almost round the compass in the 

 night of August 14. The storm appears to have passed from the 

 island of St. Thomas, near Porto Rico, to the south-east coast of Nova 

 Scotia, in about six days, consequently it must have moved at tho rate 

 it 17 miles per hour ; and by the positions of the different points 

 at which its effects were at the same time felt, its diameter must have 

 been about 150 or 200 miles. 



A movement of progression combined with a movement of rotation 

 in the direction of the points N., W., S., E., is also indicated by the 

 phenomena of the Barbadoes hurricane in August, 1831, in July, 1837, 

 and of the hurricane at Antigua, August 2 of the latter year. But of 

 the North Atlantic storms, that which presents the most remarkable 

 phenomena is one which raged between the 12th and 23rd of August, 

 Us of the circumstances attending it hare been given at 

 length, with a chart of its course, by Sir W. Reid, in his work on 



n; and it appears that it was first felt in Lit. 17 30' N., about 

 100 miles eastward of Antigua, though it may have had its origin still 

 farther eastward. 



By the effects experienced at different points on the ocean, Sir W. 

 IU-i'1 concludes that the centre or axis of the storm advanced at first 

 from east to west nearly ; and after moving in that direction about two 

 days, it turned towards the north-west, as if the storm had been 



> ly deflected from the land ; and when the whirlwind ceased to 

 he noticed, it was passing eastward across the Atlantic to the south of 

 Newfoundland. On the 18th of August, 1837, a ship, named the 

 Kawlins, was becalmed for an hour in lat. 30 30" N. nearly ; at that 



mother, named the Calypso, above three degrees northward of the 

 Hawliu.x, wa.< thrown on her beam-ends with the wind successively at 

 \.\V., \V.. and S.\V. ; and a ship, named the Sophia, situated about 



towards the north-east of the Rawlins, evidently eastward of the 

 storm's centre, experienced the hurricane from the E.N.E., E., and 



'.. Previously to the temporary calm, the wind at the place of 

 the Rawlina had been N.E. by E. and N., and afterwards it suddenly 



d to tho S.W. These circumstances sufficiently indicate that 

 the whirlwind had then a progressive motion towards the north-west, 



t the same time a rotation in the direction of the points N., W., 

 On the 20th of August the wind at the point occupied by the 

 Sophia appeared to veer back, first to the east, and subsequently to the 

 north; and since at this time tho progressive movement of the hurri- 

 cane had changed from a south-west to a north-east direction, the 



_; of the wind admits of being explained on the supposition 

 that the Sophia had then fallen into the western semicircle of the 

 whirlwind, while the latter, still revolving in the same direction, passed 



her. 



That independent whirlwinds occasionally interfere with each other 

 may be inferred from the circumstances attending the voyage of the 

 Castries from St. Lucia to England in the same year (1837). This ship, 

 between the 14th and 25th of August, sailed nearly from south to 

 north on the chord of the arc described by the centre of the great 

 hurricane just mentioned. On the 14th and 15th, in about the 18th 

 degree of north latitude, where the wind usually blows from the 

 east, she felt a gale, which at first came from S.S.W., and afterwards 

 changed to S.E., an if she had crossed the eastern side of a storm 



ing in the direction N., W., S., E., and whose centre was moving 

 nearly from east to west : this was in fact the said hurricane near the 

 place where it was first observed. The Castries then sailed northward 

 with fair weather till August 24th, when, in lat. 35 4(1' N. and in 

 long. i'7 J 40' \V. nearly, she was overtaken by a whirlwind which 

 passed over her. Now this could not have been the great hurricane 

 before mentioned, since at that time the latter had passed beyond 

 the spot towards the N.E., and the rotation at its southern extremity 

 must have caused at the place a west wind to be felt ; whereas the 

 1 the wind at the ship was at first from E.S.E., subsequently 

 changing to N.E.. N., and N.W. : the ship must evidently therefore 

 bare been then in the north-eastern side of a whirlwind coming 

 np from the S.E., and revolving, like the others, in the direction 



N., W., S., E. This whirlwind must have fallen into the track 

 pursued by the former, and probably both became afterwards blended 

 together. 



Mr. Redfleld, Professor Dove, and Sir W. Reid, independently of 

 each other, and nearly at the same time, ascertained, from the accounts 

 of persons who had navigated the southern hemisphere, that in the 

 whirlwind storms of those regions the rotation takes place in the order 

 of the cardinal points N., E., S., W., or contrary to that in which the 

 rotations are made in the North Atlantic, the axis of the storm having 

 also a progressive motion from the equator obliquely towards the south 

 pole. Such appears to have been the nature o the storm near the isle 

 of Rodriguez, February, 1807, in which the Blenheim, the flag-ship of 

 Sir Thomas Troubridge, foundered ; for it is observed by Sir W. Reid, 

 that the Harrier, brig of war (one of the squadron), by scudding before 

 the wind from the 1st to the 4th of February, described about three- 

 quarters of the circumference of a circle iu the order just mentioned. 

 And since the ships first received the wind from the north-east, it may 

 be inferred that, by sailing south-westward faster than the storm 

 advanced, they actually overtook it at its south-east side. A like cir- 

 cumstance occurred to the ship Neptune, during its voyage from 

 Calcutta to the Cape, in 1835. From a French account of the hurri- 

 cane which was felt at Mauritius in March, 1818, it appears that 

 the wind began early in the morning to blow from S.S. E. and S. ; but 

 in about an hour it changed to E. ; and at daybreak it became N.N.E. 

 and N., and when the storm ceased it blew from N.W. These circum- 

 stances indicate a rotation in the order N., E., S., W., about an axis 

 passing a little way to the north of the island, from nearly east to 

 south-west. 



But the most remarkable storm which Sir W. Reid has investigated 

 is that which occurred in the Indian Ocean, in March, 1809, when the 

 fleet, under the convoy of the Culloden and Terpsichore, suffered 

 severely. The fleet, homeward bound from India, had got in lat. 

 21 * S., when, on March 1 4, the hurricane became so violent that the 

 ships were dispersed. By tracing the courses which they pursued, and 

 also those of four ships which had sailed from the Cape to cruise near 

 Mauritius, Colonel Reid found that the general movement of the 

 storm from long. 80 E., where it was first felt, to long. 55 E., was 

 from N.E. to S.W. nearly : from thence the path turned abruptly, and 

 its direction afterwards was from N.W. to S.E. It therefore described 

 a curve-lino similar to that of the North Atlantic storm in August, 

 1837, but in a direction tending towards the south pole; and the 

 manner in which the wind veered at each of the ships whose logs have 

 been examined is capable of being represented by assuming that the 

 rotation was, as in the preceding cases, according to the order of the 

 points N., E., S., W. 



From the 12th to the 15th of March the 'whole fleet appears to have 

 been near the southern extremity of the vortex, and to have sailed in 

 a direction "parallel to the path of the axis. Seven of the ships, by 

 lying to and falling to the southward, got out of the hurricane on the 

 15th; but on the 18th, one of them, the Huddart, fell into the southern 

 branch of the line described by the axis, and crossed the northern 

 extremity of the vortex as that axis moved south-eastward. 



The Culloden, with part of the fleet, by sailing eastward, got, on the 

 15th, nearly to the centre of the vortex in the northern branch; on 

 the 15th and 16th this ship scudded before the wind ; but it after- 

 wards changed its course to S.E., and on the 19th it got out of the 

 storm. The ships which followed her probably continued to go before 

 the wind ; they thus kept near the centre of the storm, where they 

 must have foundered. 



In November of the same year, a hurricane which commenced in 

 lat. 5 S. and long. 90 E., appears to have had little progressive motion; 

 all the ships which were exposed to it experienced a temporary calm in 

 the midst of the storm, and on the afternoon of one day, November 21, 

 the wind veered rapidly quite round the horizon in the order N., E,, 

 S., W. 



The whirlwinds in the Sea of China appear to differ in no respect 

 from those which take place on the coast of North America. During 

 a hurricane on the coast near -Canton, August, 1829, when the East 

 India Company's ship Bridgewater was driven on shore, the changes of 

 the wind were successively from N. to E., and to E.S.E., ending at 

 S. E. ; therefore, if it be supposed that the course of the storm was 

 nearly from E. to W., and that the ship was to the north of its centre, 

 the rotation must have been in the order N., W., S., E. It has been 

 ascertained that the rotations took place in the same order during the 

 hurricanes of 1832 and 1835. 



Little, comparatively, is known of the storms iu the Pacific Ocean ; 

 but they also are of a rotatory character. 



In higher latitudes the storms are irregular, probably because the 

 vortices follow each other in the same direction and interfere with 

 each other's gyrations. The great storm which, in 1838, was felt ou 

 the south coast of Ireland, and proceeded from thence along the west 

 coast of Scotland, had all the characters of a whirlwind. It is stated 

 by Sir W. Reid, that on tho 1 4th of February, while at Cape Clear, the 

 wind blew from S.E.; off Oporto the gale was from S.W. ; at the same 

 time, at the bottom of the Bay of Biscay, it was felt from S. and S.W.; 

 and at the Shetland Islands, from -the 16th to the 20th of February, 

 the wind blew successively from S.E., S., and S.W. At Cadiz, between 

 the 7th and 12th of February, the wind blew from S.W. and W. ; and 



