226 



THREE CRUISES OF THE '' BLAKE. 



800 fathoms than we find in the corresponding belt of the sec- 

 tion of the Windward Passage between Cuba and San Domingo. 

 This section has in fact at that depth more the character of an 

 oceanic section than has the section of the Windward Passage. 

 This may be due, perhaps, to the fact that the water in the 

 eastern part of the Caribbean is not so greatly superheated 

 as in the belt to the northward of the Greater Antilles, from 

 St. Thomas to San Domingo, which is forced into the funnel 

 ending in the Old Bahama Channel, and finds an outlet into 

 the Honduras basin of the Caribbean through the Windward 



Cape Cruz Cuba. 



Fig. 1.51. 



Passage. Or it may be that the colder water which flows into 

 the eastern Caribbean through the Anegada Channel passes 

 to the south of Porto Rico and San Domingro as far as the 

 canon which connects the eastern Caribbean with the Honduras 

 basin. 



In the section from Santiago de Cuba to Jamaica (Fig. 152) 

 across the Formigas Bank, there are no marked departures from 

 the temperatures of the section across the Windward Passage. 

 This section goes across the eastern extremity of Bartlett's Deep 

 (see also section, Fig. 153), and at a depth of 2,978 fathoms 

 has a temperature of 39°. This temperature may be due to the 

 cold water on the ridge of the Windward Passage (39° at 932 



