BIGELOW: EXPLORATIONS IN THE GULF OF MAINE. 75 
running southeastward from Mt. Desert (Fig. 32) shows the increase 
in salinity passing off shore in that region. 
In Massachusetts Bay two pairs of Stations, 6 and 45, and 5 and 46, 
(figs. 27, 28) were taken six weeks apart, purposely to show seasonal 
change, if any. But the 
sections show that at both Fz. 37 32 28 
46 and 5 the salinity at 0 
the surface was 31.6, at 30 
fathoms 32.5, and also that 
there was apparently noth- 
ing to separate Station 6 
from Station 45, at both 
of which the surface sa- 
linity was 31.9; though as 
the depth at the former 
was twenty-five and at the 
latter forty fathoms, only 
two samples being taken 
at each, it is possible that 
there may be some slight 
divergence in the interme- 
diate zone. Inshort, these 
four stations certainly do 10 
not suggest that there was {20 
any seasonal change in the ee / 
salinity in Massachusetts Ste 
B RS +; Fia. 32.— Salinity profile from near Mt. Desert 
ay during our absence, (Station 37) to Station 28. 
although there was a very 
pronounced rise in temperature (p. 58) at all depths below five fathoms. 
Stations 44, 45, 46, all taken on the same day, afford a profile across 
the Bay, from south to north (fig. 33). The curves show that the 
core of fresh surface water was thickest in the northern half of the Bay. 
And as Station 6 is, as we have just seen, interchangeable with 45, and 
5 with 46, it is clear that this is the characteristic condition in mid- 
summer. In the southern half of the Bay, the curve of 32.2, found at 
twenty fathoms at Station 46, rose to within eight fathoms of the sur- 
face; and the surface salinity was 32 instead of 31.9. But below twenty 
fathoms the salinities were slightly lower at Station 44 than in the 
centre of the Bay. Thus we find reproduced, but on a much smaller 
scale, the spreading of the salinity curves so pronounced on German 
Bank, and in the mouth of the Grand Manan Channel. And as 
pointed out (p. 56) the same thing was true of the temperatures. 
Y= 
| py 
Wy 
