450 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1740. 



much warmer than the continent, that hes at an equal distance, on the opposite 

 point : from this very warm place, the wind blows to a place much colder ; and 

 yet there must be a natural cause of all this apparent contradiction to the laws 

 of nature. 



It will be in vain to seek for the cause of the wind in this ocean itself, or in 

 the air over it, influenced only by the sun, and the surface of the sea. But 

 there may be tornados in those seas : our seamen often meet them between the 

 tropics, seldom in the ocean to the north of the northern tropic. But were 

 they more frequent and violent than they really are, yet they are not last- 

 ing, and therefore cannot produce a long steady course of south-west winds 

 with us. 



Probably our south-west wind is no other than an eddy of the trade-wind, re- 

 flected from America to us. There are also some other facts which strongly 

 support this hypothesis ; viz. currents of the sea, and the wind in the Atlantic 

 ocean, to the northward of the trade-wind. 



With regard to the currents, Dampier tells us, it is generally observed by 

 seamen, that, in all places where the trade-wind blows, the current moves the 

 same way with the wind ; and that though it be perceived most near the shore, 

 yet it makes no sensible rising in the water, as the tides do. He says, there is 

 always a strong current setting from Cape St. Augustin westward, occasioned, 

 as he remarks, by the south-east trade-wind driving the surface slanting on the 

 coast of Brasil ; which, being there stopped by the land, bends its course 

 northerly, towards Cape St. Augustin ; and, after it has doubled that promon- 

 tory, it falls away towards the West-Indies, down along the coast westward, till 

 it comes to Cape Gratia de Dios ; from thence north-west towards Cape Catoch 

 in Jucatan, thence to the northward between Jucatan and Cuba. He says, that 

 in the channel, between Jucatan and Cuba, he has found the currents extraor- 

 dinarily strong ; that it is probable, that the current which sets to leeward, on 

 all the coast from Cape St. Augustin to Cape Catoch, never enters the bay of 

 Mexico, but bends still to the northward, till it is checked by the Florida shore; 

 and then it wheels about to the east, till it comes near the gulph's mouth, and 

 passes with great strength through the gulph of Florida, which is the most re- 

 markable gulph in the world for its currents, because it always sets very strong 

 to the north. 



Let us then suppose the wind, which drives this water before it, to follow it 

 much in the same course ; and that, instead of striking against one plain sur- 

 face, with such an inclination as would dn-ect it to us, it strikes against a mil- 

 lion, yet still bending this way : let this natural supposition be admitted, and 

 we have the very thing sought for, viz. a proper direction. 



