THE GULP STREAM. 343 



winds came with the gentle white-robed birds. As a natural 

 consequence, mind and heart were jDervaded with the dead faith 

 of old and buried nations. Messages of love and peace seemed 

 winged from heaven to earth. Give us, we inwardly exclaimed, 

 the old dream of the past, in exchange for some of the fresher 

 and more orthodox superstitions of modern times. It certainly 

 affords a temporary pleasure to diversify hackneyed beliefs with 

 a little of the antique. 



We passed within ten or twelve miles of Jupiter Inlet and 

 Jupiter Lighthouse, both being plainly in view. Soon after, the 

 course of our ship was altered, and, steaming a little south of east, 

 all traces of the Western Continent were lost to view, but low, 

 light-colored clouds still curtained the vanished land. 



Nearly all our passengers were upon the upper deck, musing 

 in grateful shadows, and, with the thermometer at 80°, feeling 

 only an agreeable warmth in the cooling wind. A marked change 

 was soon observed in the color of the water. Its deep, rich, 

 beautiful blue was unlike anything we had observed before or 

 since we left New York. It attracted and riveted all eyes, and 

 loosened every tongue. Gentlemen vied with the ladies in exr 

 pressing the pleasure caused by this new sensation. One passen- 

 ger, of a domestic turn of mind, inferred that it was Neptune's 

 washing day, and that he had made a liberal use of his indigo 

 bag. The mystery was soon explained. We were crossing the 

 Gulf Stream; unconsciously we had entered the great ocean river. 

 It had gathered up tlic equatorial heats, and, impelled by great 

 natural laws which man has not been able as yet to fully discover 

 and satisfactorily explain, it was executing its great beneficent 

 mission, and materially aiding in equalizing the temperature of 

 regions widely separated. How unlike it seemed to the Gulf 

 Stream we crossed a year before! Then we brought with us from 

 the frozen north opposing winds — and a just resentment was felt 



