300 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. 



experiences from the eastern coasts of continents. The ve 

 locity of this current, computed by Daussy from data sup- 

 plied by bottles purposely thrown overboard and subse- 

 quently picked up in different localities, agrees within 

 one eighteenth part with the velocity of ten Trench nautical 

 miles in twenty-four hours, which I had previously deduced 

 from comparing the experience of different navigators. ( 369 ) 

 Columbus was aware of the existence of this current at 

 the period of his third voyage, (the first in which he sought to 

 enter the tropics in the meridian of the Canary Islands), since 

 we find in his journal the following passage : " I regard 

 it as proved that the waters of the sea move from east to 

 west as do the heavens" (or the apparent motion of the 

 sun, moon, and stars), " las aguas van con los cielos." ( 37 ) 

 Of the narrow currents, or true oceanic rivers, of which 

 we have spoken, some carry warm water into higher, and 

 others cold water into lower latitudes. To the first class 

 belongs the celebrated gulf stream, ( 371 ) the existence of 

 which was recognised by Anghiera, ( 372 ) and more particu- 

 larly by Sir Humphry Gilbert, as early as the sixteenth 

 century, and of which the first origin and impulse is to be 

 sought to the south of the Cape of Good Hope. After a 

 wide circuit, it pours itself from the Caribbean Sea and the 

 Mexican Gulf through the channel of the Bahamas, and 

 following a direction from S.S.W. to N.N.E., deviates more 

 and more from the coast of the United States, until, de- 

 flected still further to the east by the banks of Newfoundland, 

 it crosses the Atlantic, and casts an abundance of tropical 

 seeds (Mimosa scandens, Guilandina bonduc, Dolichos 

 urens) on the coasts of Ireland, of the Hebrides, and of 

 Norway. Its north-easternmost prolongation mitigates the 



