IS THE GULF STREAM A MYTH? 



135 



equatorial current from the shores of North America. 

 Knowing that there is an underflow towards the 

 equator, we see that there must be a surface-flow 

 towards the Poles. And this flow must as inevitably 

 result in an easterly motion, as the underflow towards 

 the equator results in a westerly motion. We have, 

 indeed, the phenomena of the trades and counter-trades 

 exhibited in water-currents instead of air-currents. 



(From St. PauVs, September 1869.)* 



FLOODS IN SWITZERLAND. 



DURING the past few weeks we have witnessed a suc- 

 cession of remarkable evidences of Nature's destructive 

 powers. The fires of Vesuvius, the earth-throes of the 

 sub-equatorial Andes, and the submarine disturbance 

 which has shaken Hawaii, have presented to us the 

 various forms of destructive action which the earth's 

 subterranean forces can assume. In the disastrous 

 floods which have recently visited the Alpine cantons 

 of Switzerland, we have evidence of the fact that 

 natural forces which we are in the habit of regarding 

 as beneficent and restorative may exhibit themselves 

 as agents of the most widespread destruction. We 

 have pointed out elsewhere (see p. 228) how enormous 

 is the amount of power of which the rain-cloud is* the 

 representative ; and in doing so we have endeavoured 

 to exhibit the contrast between the steady action of 



* See also The Student for July 1868. 



