xii INTRODUCTION 



man, and that is as a vast deodorizer. It should be 

 more generally known than it is, that the free air 

 of heaven, becoming fatal to animal life after it has 

 oxygenated the blood of countless millions, is then a 

 beneficent food for plant life, the green leaves drawing 

 their substance from it in combination with sunlight, 

 and so proving Nature's intolerance of waste in any 

 form. It is more widely known that the solid matters, 

 the residual products of animal and vegetable life 

 which are so offensive to the senses and so dangerous 

 to health if unabsorbed, are in large measure dealt 

 with by the kindly earth, and there are reconverted 

 into nourishing food. But it is hardly realized at all 

 that the ocean receives from the earth an incalculable 

 quantity of these foul and effete residuals through 

 the medium of the rivers, and deals with them rapidly 

 and effectively in mysterious ways, of which, in the 

 nature of things, we can know but little, though we 

 may and should know that it does thus deal with 

 them. 



Of the agencies at work by which these mighty 

 processes for the benefit of mankind are carried on, 

 I have endeavoured to treat in the chapters on the 

 winds and currents of the ocean, avoiding, as far as 

 possible, scientific terminology and long drawn-out 

 explanations. And when it is remembered how vast 

 is the field covered by what is known as meteorology, 

 or the science of weather, it will at once be seen how 

 scanty and rapid has been the manner in which I 

 have been compelled to treat this vast, important 

 subject. The work of the winds, for instance, which 

 is to convey to the land the revivifying exhalations 

 from the ocean, to keep up the circulation of the 



