326 THEORY OF WINDS. 



latitudes that revolve at the rate of 8 or 9 hundred 

 miles per hour, to those which move only 6 or 7 

 hundred miles per hour.* The south west and 

 north east are the prevalent winds in the United 

 States and the west of Europe. In Great Britain 

 they blow about 300 days in the year. 



It has been observed in the United States of 

 America, that regular winds generally follow the 

 sun, exhibiting a tolerably uniform succession of 

 circuits from left to right, and blowing from all 

 points of the compass within a few days. For 

 example, the ordinary succession of winds is, 

 first, from the north ; next, from the north-east, 

 then from the east ; south-east ; south ; south- 

 west ; west ; north-west, and so on, in pretty 

 regular succession, and rarely, if ever, perform- 

 ing an entire circuit in the opposite direction. 

 As the greater portion of the United States is 

 more heated by the sun than the ocean, even 

 south of them, (because the surface is stationary,) 

 and for a longer time, the wind blows from the 

 south-west a greater number of days than from 

 any other quarter. At the same time, it is worthy 

 of notice, that during extremely cold winters, the 



* It is the meeting of this wind, charged with aqueous vapour 

 from the ocean, with the colder north and north-east currents, 

 which causes vast precipitations of rain in the United States, 

 during the latter part of summer and beginning of autumn, 

 attended with the most fearful displays of thunder and lightning, 

 when extensive hurricanes sweep the Gulf of Mexico and the 

 southern portions of the Union. 



