IS THE GULF STREAM A MYTH? 149 



agent being the intense lieat of the tropical sun. No 

 one can doubt that this agent is one of adequate power. 

 Indeed, the winds, conceived by Franklin to be the 

 primary cause of the Atlantic currents, are in reality 

 due to the merest fraction of the energy inherent in 

 the sun's heat. 



"We have other evidence that the indraught is from 

 below, in the comparative coldness of the equatorial 

 current. The Gulf Stream is warm by comparison 

 with the surrounding waters, but the equatorial cur- 

 rent is cooler than the tropical seas. According to 

 Professor Ansted, the southern portion of the equa- 

 torial current, as it flows past Brazil, " is everywhere a 

 cold current, generally from four to six degrees below 

 the adjacent ocean." 



Having once detected the mainspring of the Gulf- 

 Stream mechanism, or rather of the whole system of 

 oceanic circulation for the movements observed in the 

 Atlantic have their exact counterpart in the Pacific 

 we have no difficulty in accounting for all the motions 

 which that mechanism exhibits. We need no longer 

 look upon the Gulf Stream as the rebound of the 

 equatorial current from the shores of North America. 

 Knowing that there is an underflow toward the 

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

 toward the Poles. And this flow must as inevitably 

 result in an easterly motion, as the underflow toward 

 the equator results in a westerly motion. "We have, 



