TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION EF. 457 
We have since found several places in the Pacific where the depth is nearly 5,170 
fathoms, or 31,000 feet, or somewhat higher than Mount Everest, which has been 
lately definitely shown to be the culminating point of the Himalayas. These very 
deep parts of the ocean are invariably near land, and are apparently in the shape of 
troughs, and are probably due to the original crumpling of the earth’s surface 
under slow contraction. 
The enormous area of the sea has a great effect upon climate, but not so much 
in the direct way formerly believed. While a mass of warm or cold water off a 
coast must to some extent modify temperature, a greater direct cause is the winds, 
which, however, are in many parts the effect of the distribution of warm and cold 
water jn the ocean perhaps thousands of miles away. Take the United Kingdom, 
notoriously warm and damp for its position in latitude. Thisis due mainly to the 
prevalence of westerly winds, These winds, again, are part of cyclonic systems 
principally engendered off the coasts of Eastern North America and Newfoundland, 
where hot and cold sea-currents, impinging on one another, give rise to gieat 
variations of temperature and movements of the atmosphere which start cyclonic 
systems travelling eastwards. 
The centre of the majority of these systems passes north of Great Britain. 
Hence the warm and damp parts of them strike the country with westerly winds, 
which have also pushed the warm water left by the dying-out current of the Gulf 
Stream off Newfoundland across the Atlantic, and raise the temperature of the 
sea off Britain. 
When the cyclonic systems pass south of England, as they occasionally do, cold 
north-east and north winds are the result, chilling the country despite the warm 
water surrounding the islands. 
It only requires a rearrangement of the direction of the main Atlantic cur- 
rents wholly to change the climate of Western Europe. Such an arrangement 
would be effected by the submergence of the Isthmus cf Panama and adjacent 
country, allowing the Equatorial Current to pass into the Pacific. The gale 
factory of the Western Atlantic would then be greatly reduced. 
The area south of the Cape of Good Hope is another birthplace of great 
cyclonic systems, the warm Agulhas Current meeting colder water moving up 
from the Polar regions; but in the Southern Ocean the conditions of the distribu- 
tion of land are different, and these systems sweep round and round the world, 
only catching and affecting the south part of Tasmania, New Zealand, and Pata- 
gonia. 
In 1894 I spoke of the movements of the lower strata of water in the sea asa 
subject on which we were only beginning to get a little light. Since that year 
we have Jearnt a little more. It is a common idea that at the bottom of the sea 
all is still; but this is a mistake, even for the deepest parts, for the tidal influence 
reaches to the bottom and keeps every particle in motion, though such motion is 
quiet and slow. 
Near the shore, however, though still in deep water, the movement may be 
considerably increased. Cases have occurred in late years where submarine cables 
have broken several hundred fathoms deep, and when picked up for repair it has 
been found that the iron wire covering has been literally rubbed away as, by a file. 
This can only be the result of an undercurrent along the bottom’ moving the 
cable to and fro. Such a current might be caused by a submarine spring, for 
there is no doubt that much fresh water finds its way into the ocean in this 
fashion, but it is more probably generally an effect of acceleration of the tidal 
movement due to the rising slope of the continent. 
In connection with this, further facts have come to light in the course of 
recent marine surveys, 
Many isolated shoal spots in the great oceans have figured in cur charts, the 
ater of reports by passing ships who have said they have seen breakers in fine 
weather, 
Such places are the terror of seamen, and it is part of the duty of surveying 
ships to verify or disprove them. Very much has been done in the last eighteen 
years, with the result that the majority of them haye, as dangers, disappeared, In 
