On the Gulf Stream and Currents of the Sea. 173 



pressure of at least one hundred pounds to the square foot ; and 

 vessels in crossing it, would sail over a ridge, as it were ; on the 

 east side of which, they would meet an easterly current, and on 

 the west side a westerly current. The resolution of the forces of 

 each of ihese currents with a northwardly set of the stream itself, 

 would induce navigators to report a northeastwardly current as 

 they ascend the other side of this ridge, and a northwest current 

 as they descend on this. Yet never was it heard that the Gulf 

 Stream runs northwest. 



Should this roof-like current be too superficial to be felt by a 

 vessel, the gulf weed and all the floating substances borne by this 

 current accross the Atlantic, would run off either on one side or 

 the other. But there is little or no gulf weed along its western 

 edge, and its prevalence on the eastern side may be accounted for 

 by the operation of an entirely different law. 



Why this warm water therefore should not appear lighter than 

 colder water, is a curious phenomenon that as far as I know, has 

 never been considered. It is worthy of investigation. Nor should 

 the paradox as to a higher level, — a double inclined plane in the 

 Gulf Stream itself, — escape attention. 



Dr. Lardner assures us, and such too is the doctrine not yet ex- 

 ploded from our popular* works, that sea water expands according 

 to the laws of fresh, and from this circumstance, he and many 

 others have argued that the fish in polar seas are preserved by the 

 cold water on top find the warmer below. Deep sea soundings 

 do not confirm this. With a surface temperature of 34P, north- 

 ern voyagers have obtained a temperature at several hundred fath- 

 oms of 25°, which according to the received laws of expansion, 

 should have the specific gravity of water at 55°. And a ther- 

 mometer thrust down the throat of a fish caught in polar seas, 

 has been said to stand at zero. The journals of arctic cruisers 

 assure us of the fact, that the deeper we go down in the northern 

 seas of America the colder the water, while off the shores of 

 Northern Europe, the warmth increases as we go down, thus show- 

 ing a warm stratum of the water to be lighter than the cold in 

 one part of the ocean, and in another contiguous to it, to be heavier. 



But to return to the mingling of the waters ; we know from a 

 familiar experiment,! that oil placed upon water in a state of rest, 



* Dr. Marcet has shown that sea water contracts till it freezes. 

 i If a bit of paper cut in the shape of a comma (,) be dipped in oil and laid on 

 water, the paper will spin round, while the oil runs off. 



