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On the Distribution of Temperature in the Gulf Stream. 29 
Art. VI.—On the Distribution of Temperature in and near the 
Gulf Stream, off the Coast of the United States, from Obser- 
vations made in the Coast Survey ; by A. D. Bacuer, Superin- 
tendent.* 
(Communicated to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, by 
Authority of the Treasury Department.) 
I propose to present to the Association a brief summary of the 
result of observations made in the progress of the Coast Survey, 
in exploring the Gulf Stream, so far as the distribution of tem- 
perature is developed by them. ‘The entire observations have 
been reduced anew, under my immediate direction, by Professor 
Pendleton, U. S. N., assistant in the Coast Survey, who has also 
gone over with me, systematically, the discussion of the work, 
preparatory to its publication in detail, and whose care, assiduity, 
and intelligence in the matter I desire here to acknowledge. 
At the Cambridge meeting of the Association, in 1849, I ex- 
plained the general plan of the exploration of the Gulf Stream, 
and presented the results of the observations made up to that 
time by Lieutenants C. H. Davis, Geo. M. Bache, S. P. Lee, and 
Richard Bache of the U. 8. Navy, in command of hydrographic 
parties in the survey. : 
Since then, the work has been continued by Lieutenants T. A. 
M. Craven and J. N. Maffitt, U.S. N., and has been extended 
south from Hatteras to Cape Canaveral. In addition to the sec- 
Hons across the stream, upon which the temperature had then 
‘Nn examined, between Cape Cod and Cape Hatteras, others 
have been since explored from Cape Fear, Charleston, St. Simon 8, 
St. Augustine, and Cape Canaveral, and new and interesting re- 
sults have been developed in relation to the distribution of tem- 
Perature across the sections, and to the connection, at least in 
Some of them, between the peculiar distribution and the form of 
the bottom of the sea. : 
he examination now made extends from about 42° north lati 
tude to 284°, and from about 654° west longitude to 803°. It 
authorizes the construction of achart of the Gulf Stream, showing 
the distribution of temperature in and near it, not only at the sur- 
ut at various depths. 
1. Distribution of temperature at different depths. 
| Having gone very fully into this subject, which was one of the 
first satisfactorily shown. by the observations, I do not intend to 
Tepeat here what was then stated, except in a general way. he 
distribution of temperatures below a certain depth, in the cold 
Current which exists between the shore and the Gulf Stream, 
and over which the warm waters of the Gulf flow, thinning out 
* From Rep. Superintend. Coast Survey, for 1854, pp. 156%—*161. 
