106 A HISTORY OF 



who always nefore had been accustomed only to the scarcely percep 

 tible risings of the Mediterranean, or the minute intumescence of the 

 Black Sea, when made at once spectators of a river rising and falling 

 thirty feet in a few hours, must, no doubt, have felt the most extreme 

 awe, and, as we are told,* a mixture of curiosity and apprehension. 

 The tides are also remarkably high on the coasts of Malay, in the 

 straits of Sunda, in the Red Sea, at the mouth of the river St. Law 

 rence, along the coasts of China and Japan, at Panama, and in the 

 gulf of Bengal. The tides at Tonquin, however, are the most remark- 

 able in the world. In this part there is but one tide, and one ebb, in 

 twenty-four hours ; whereas, as we have said before, in other places 

 there are x two. Besides, there, twice in each month, there is no tide 

 at all, when the moon is near the equinoctial, the water being for some 

 time quite stagnant. These, with some other odd appearances attend- 

 ing the same phenomena, were considered by many as inscrutable ; 

 but Sir Isaac Newton, with peculiar sagacity, adjudged them to arise 

 from the concurrence of two tides, one from the South Sea, and the 

 other from the Indian Ocean. Of each of these tides there come suc- 

 cessively two every day ; two at one time greater, and two at another 

 that are less. The time between the arrival of the two greater, is 

 considered by him as high tide ; the time between the two lesser, as 

 ebb. In short, with this clue, that great mathematician solved every 

 appearance, and so established his theory as to silence every opposer 



This fluctuation of the sea from the tides, produces another, and 

 more constant rotation of its waters, from the east to the west, in this 

 respect following the course of the moon. This may be considered as 

 one great and general current of the waters of the sea ; and although 

 it be not every where distinguishable, it is nevertheless every where 

 existent, except when opposed by some particular current or eddy 

 produced by partial and local causes. This tendency of the sea to- 

 wards the west, is plainly perceivable in all the great straits of the 

 ocean ; as, for instance, in those of Magellan, where the tide running 

 in from the east, rises twenty feet high, and continues flowing six 

 hours ; whereas the ebb continues but two hours, and the current is 

 directed to the west. This proves that the flux is not equal to the re- 

 flux ; and that from both results a motion of the sea westward, which is 

 more powerful during the time of the flux than the reflux. 



But this motion westward has been sensibly observed by navigators, 

 in their passage back from India to Madagascar, and so on to Africa. 

 In the great Pacific Ocean also it is very perceivable ; but the places 

 where it is most obvious, are, as was said, in those straits which join one 

 ocean to another. In the straits between, the Maldivia islands, in the 

 gulf of Mexico, between Cuba and Jucatan. In the straits of the 

 gulf of Paria, the motion is so violent, that it hath received the appel- 

 lation of the Dragon's Mouth. Northward, in the sea of Canada, in 

 Waigat's straits, in the straits of Java, and in short, in every strait 

 where the ocean on one part pours into the ocean on the other. In 

 this manner, therefore, is the sea carried with an unceasing circula- 

 tion round the globe ; and, at the same time that its waters are poshed 



* Qtiintus Curtius. 



