!00 



60 



ADOR ■ -^^ V 



^0^ 



foundland 



/VlV!\ 

 ".Grtind Bank 



20 



/ ^ 



X 



N N 



— N IS V 



••* .Azore^ Is ' 



y 



Canary Is. 



'Cape Verd ls.». 



20° 



OUTUNE MAP SHOWING GE;NE;RAIv DIRECTION OF TliE GULI^ STREAM AND OTHER 

 CURRENTS IN THE NORTH ATLANTIC OCEAN 



the wind or by engines, as nearly as pos- 

 sible on a given compass course and for 

 a given distance as ascertained by the log 

 or by the engine revolutions, but she is 

 deflected from that course and distance 

 by winds, waves, bad steering, etc., and 

 by currents to an unknown amount. By 

 astronomical observation the captain as- 

 certains the position of his ship from 

 time to time, and the difference between 

 this position and the supposed position 

 is assumed to give the direction and 

 velocity of the current aft'ecting the ship 

 during the interval. 



Still another method has been prac- 

 ticed, and even now i". favored by some 

 for determining the flow of currents. 

 Bottles or floats of various descriptions 

 are thrown overl)oard from vessels at 

 sea, each one containing a paper on 

 which is written the date and position at 

 which it is put afloat, and a request 

 printed in various languages asking the 

 finder to mark the date and locality 

 where found and forward it to some 

 official. 



This method is of but little real value. 

 The bottle is tossed by the waves and 



driven by the wind. If it is picked up 

 on the shore, there is no means of know- 

 ing how long it has been traveling at sea 

 and how long idle on ^he beach and when 

 it is found, all that it tells is that it has 

 journeyed from one point to another, but 

 by what route it is impossible to tell. 



Floats put adrift in the Atlantic be- 

 tween Newfoundland and the Azores 

 have been found distributed, some of 

 them years afterward, all the way from 

 Iceland and Norway to the West Indian 

 Islands and on the shores of the Gulf of 

 AFexico. 



The importance of a knowledge of the 

 Gulf Stream to commercial interests was 

 early recognized by the Congress in the 

 passage of an act authorizing the Coast 

 Survey to include it within the scope of 

 its work, and later, authority was given 

 to examine the Sargasso Sea (the body 

 of water lying in the center of the grand 

 circular movements of currents in the 

 Atlantic) and also the mate to the Gulf 

 Stream in the Pacific, called the Kuro- 

 Shiwo. or Black Stream, of Japan, which 

 pours its warm waters toward our west- 

 ern shores to temper its climate, in the 



772 



