PHYSICAL OCEANOGKAPHY OF THE GULF OF MAINE 



525 



else, even after the unusually severe winter of 1920, make it seem unlikely that the 

 offshore parts of the gulf ever chill below 1° at the 40-meter level. Temperatures 

 of 1° to 2° at 40 to 50 meters in Massachusetts Bay early in February, 1925 (p. 658) , 

 contrasting with 0.4° on March 5, 1920 (station 20062), suggest that this stratum is 

 about 1° warmer after a warm winter than after a cold one. 



Rising temperature, passing offshore to 2° to 4° over the banks, with an abrupt 

 transition to much higher values (9°) a few miles to seaward of the edge of the con- 

 tinent, is the most instructive'general feature of this 40-meter chart. This, however, 



Fig. 3.— Vertical distribution of temperature off northern Cape Cod, March to July. A, Iilarch 24, 1920 

 (station 200S8); B, April 18, 1920 (station 20116); C, May 16, 1920 (station 20125); D, July 19, 1914 

 (station 10214) 



was compKcated at the time by an expansion of water colder than that across the 

 eastern end of Georges Bank from the neighboring part of the basin, alternating with 

 a warm tongue that intruded inward along the Eastern Channel and a second area 

 of cold (2°) water that reached Browns Bank from the eastward.^ 



» A profile run from Shelburne, Noya Scotia, to the edge of the continent in March (stations 20073 to 20077) affords a cross 

 section of this. 



