58 OUR HERITAGE THE SEA 



trace of them has ever been found in America until 

 the beginning of the accursed slave trade between the 

 two countries, and that did not commence until after 

 the Renaissance or in comparatively modern times. 

 But with the advent of steam this beautiful expanse 

 of ocean began to be less accounted of. It was the 

 paradise of the sailor, who often boasted that he could 

 sail for thousands of miles without touching a brace 

 except to freshen the nip, i.e. to take a pull so 

 that the ropes should not be too long bent at the 

 one spot. 



It is an ocean, too, singularly free from obstruc- 

 tions in the shape of islands. Trinidad, and the rocks 

 of Martin Vaz, Fernando Noronha, Ascension, St. 

 Helena: these few peaks of huge submerged moun- 

 tains rear their heads above its quiet waters mostly 

 at vast distances from one another, but are quite 

 unable to do anything by way of disturbing the 

 majestic flow of the Trades. And in its centre there 

 is a space large enough to contain a mighty continent, 

 where now no man ever comes with the exception, 

 perhaps, of a solitary New Bedford whaler, one of the 

 half-dozen or so still pursuing this historic trade in 

 the ocean solitudes. It is, too, the most evenly deep 

 ocean. Down its centre runs the South Atlantic 

 ridge which shoals to 7000 feet, but has an average 

 depth of 17,000 feet. The islands before mentioned 

 spring almost perpendicularly from such stupendous 

 depths as these. 



When, however, we leave the fairly well-marked 

 southern limit of the Trade Wind, we enter at once 

 upon a region of unrest, and what the sailor calls 

 emphatically " dirty weather," and bid farewell to 



