VORTEX WATER WHEEL, 



[1852. 



ation of Lis researches on the temperatures at the surface of the 

 globe. In former communications he has furnished us with maps 

 showing, so far as observation permits, the isothermals of the 

 whole o-lobe in every month of the year. He has now given us, 

 — fii-st, the normal temperatures of each parallel of latitude in 

 each month ; being the average of all the temperatures in that 

 parallel in such month, — and, second, the abnormal temperatures, 

 or the difference between the temperature of each place and the 

 mean temperature of its paraUel. From these again are formed 

 lines of abnormal temperature for each month — surrounding and 

 marking out those districts or localities which, from peculiarities 

 of the sui-fiice or other causes affecting the distribution of heat, are 

 characterized by excessive abnormal heat or abnormal cold. The 

 importance of these researches on the general theory of the 

 causes which interfere with the equable distribution of heat 

 according to latitude, is obvious. 



The activity which has prevailed so greatly of late in the col- 

 lection of meteorological data has been almost exclusively confined 

 to that portion of the surface of the globe which is occupied by 

 land, although the portion covered by the ocean is not only much 

 greater in extent, but is also better suited for the solution of 

 several meteorolog-ical problems. Many striking examples might 

 be adduced to show that it is " systematic direction," and not 

 " individual zeal " in naval men, which has been wanting; and 

 it has been therefore with great satisfaction that meteorologists 

 have learnt that a proposition has recently been made from the 

 United States Government, to the British Government to under- 

 take, conjointly and in co-operation, a system of meteorological 

 observations, to be made at sea in all ships belonging to the 

 naval service of the two countries, and sufficiently simple to be 

 participated in by the merchant service also. In a partial trial 

 which has been already made of this system in the United States, 

 it has been found to produce results which, exclusively of their 

 scientific beanng, are of great importance to the interests of navi- 

 gation and commerce, in materially shortening passages by the 

 knowledge of prevailing winds and currents at particular seasons. 

 The practical advanfciges arising from the co-ordination of the 

 observations in the Hydrographic Office of the United States, 

 and the circulation of the charts of the winds and currents, and 

 of the sailing directions founded on them, have been such and 

 so appreciated, that there are now, as it is stated, more than one 

 thousand masters of American ships engaged in making them. 

 The request for British co-operation in an undertaking so hon- 

 ourable to the country in which it originated, was referred in the 

 spring of this year by the Earl of Malmesbury to the President 

 and Council of the Royal Society for a Report. 



Amongst the most valuable results which Physical Sciences 

 may expect to obtain from this extensive system of nautical ob- 

 servation, we may reckon the constructiouof charts of the isother- 

 mals of the surface of the ocean corresponding to ever}' month in 

 the year, similar to Prof Do\e's monthly isothermals of the tem- 

 perature of the air; and a knowledge of the normal condition as 

 well as the abnormal valuations, with their special causes and 

 effects, of the great Gulf-stream which connects the shores of the 

 Old and New World, and in its normal effects is influential in 

 many ways on the climate of the United States and Western 

 Europe, whilst its abnormal effects are princijially known, so far 

 as we are yet awai'e, by the peculiarities of climate which they 

 occasionally produce on the European side of the Atlantic. Of 

 the extent, depth, and limits of this remarkable current in ordi- 

 nary and exti-aordinary years we are as yet very imperfectly in- 

 formed. Of the zoology of the great tracts of ocean which are 

 covered by its banks of seaweed, we know nothing beyond the 

 fact that they are the habitation of a countless number of oceanic 

 animals — giving rise possibly to deposits which may have distinc- 

 tive characters from littoral deposits or from those of marine 



estuaries. But doubtless we can now estimate only a small part of 

 the advantages which Terrestrial Physics as well as Hydrography 

 and Navigation would derive from the concurrent exertions of 

 the two great maritime nations in the way that has been pointed 

 out. 



The analogy of the configuration of the land and sea on the 

 north of the continents of Asia and America h^s for some time 

 past caused an opinion to be entei-tained that the sea on the north 

 of the Parry Islands might be as open as it is known to be 

 throughout the year in the same latitude on the north of the Sibe- 

 rian Islands. The expectation that Wellington Strait might, as a 

 continuation of Barrow's Strait, prove a channel of communication 

 from the Atlantic into that part of the Polar Ocean, has been consi- 

 derably strengthened in the last year by the discoveries which we 

 owe to the hardiliood and intrepidity of our merchant seamen. 

 The access to the Polar Ocean, and the degi-ee in which it may 

 be navigable for purposes of discovery or scientific research, are 

 amongst the few geographical problems of high interest which 

 remain to be soh'ed; and we may confidently look for a solution, 

 in the direction at least that has been adverted to, by the Expe- 

 dition which has be^n despatched under Sir Edward Belcher to 

 follow up the discovered traces of Sir John Franklin's vessels. 



Gentlemen, I have now occupied fully as much of your time 

 and attention as I can venture to trespass on, — and yet have 

 found it impossible to comprehend within the limits of a diseouree 

 all the topics to which I would have gladly called your notice, 

 even in those branches of knowledge in which I may consider 

 myself as least uninformed, in three of the seven departments into 

 which our science is divided. I have left wholly untouched those 

 wide fields of Geology and Natural History, which would of 

 themselves have furnished fitting subjects for an address of still 

 longer duration. No one can be more sensible of this, and of 

 many other imperfections and deficiencies, than the individual 

 who addresses you ; yet, if he has not wholly failed in the purpose 

 he designed — if the impression which he has endeavoured to 

 convey, however faint may be the image, be true to that which 

 it is intended to represent — you have not failed to recognize the 

 gratifying picture of British Science in the full career of energetic 

 action and advancement, pressing forward in every direction to 

 fill the full measure of the sphere of its activity in the domain of 

 intellectual culture; regardful on the one hand of the minutest 

 details in the patient examination of natural facts, and on the 

 other hand diligent in combining them into generalizations of 

 the highest order, by the aid of those principles of inductive phil- 

 osophy which are the surest guide of the human intellect to the 

 comprehension of the laws and order of the material universe. 



Vortex Water Wheel. 



On a new form of Vortex Water- Wheel. By J. Thomson, C. E. 

 This wheel, Mr. Thomson observed, is a new variety of the 

 general class of water-wheels called turbines. In this machine 

 the moving wheel is placed within a chamber of a nearly circular 

 form. Tiie water is injected into the chamber tangentially at the 

 circumference, and thus it receives a rapid motion of rotiition. 

 Retaining this motioii, it passes onwards towards the centre, 

 where alone it is free to make its exit. The wheel which is 

 placed within the chamber, and which almost entirely fills it, is 

 divided by thin partitions into a great number of radiating pas- 

 sages. Through these passages the water must flow on its course 

 towards the ceutre, and in doing so imparts its own rotatory 

 • motion to the wheel. The whirlpool of water acting within the 

 wheel-chamber being one principal feature of this turbine, leads 

 to the name vortex srs a suitable designation for the machine as 

 a whole. For some time past there have been several of these 

 new turbines in course of construction and erection. The one 



