254 Proximate Causes of certain Winds and Storms. 



li mating the amount of movement in the atmosphere by the time 

 durins; which it occurs. 



O 



(/.) "The north winds (los nories,) which are north west winds, 

 blow in the gulf of Mexico from the the autumnal to the spring equi- 

 nox. These north wind hurricanes generally remain for three or 

 four days and sometimes for ten or twelve."" 



(g.) If there be a predominance of either northerly or southerly 

 winds in the North Pacific Ocean, it is not such as to have attracted 

 the particular attention of navigators. " On the north ivest coast of 

 America from the straits of Behring to 30^ of northern latitude, the 

 winds are variable. Capt. Cook found in March, in the 44th degree 

 of latitude, a fresh and constant north west, which continued until 

 the beginning of summer with the exception of a south east, which 

 lasted however, only sis hours, and La Perouse, Portlock and Dixon 

 did not experience the south winds in the summer. According to 

 Vancouver and the Spanish navigators, the north and north west are 

 the most prevailing. (Krusenstern.) All this however applies, al- 

 most exclusively, to the summer months. During the winter, Messrs. 

 Lewis and Clarke at the mouth of the Columbia River, had long 

 continued gales from the S. W. and deluges of rain. 



(A.) The violent winds that prevail at Cape Horn are not accu- 

 rately from the west point, but from sonie other between the west 

 and south. " I cannot in any case, concur in recommending the 

 running into the latitude of 61° or 62° before any endeavor is made 

 to stand to the westward. We found neither the cunent nor the 

 storms, Avhich the running so far to the southward is supposed neces^ 

 sary to avoid ; and indeed, as the winds almost constantly blow from 

 that quarter, it is scarcely possible to pursue the adviceJ'^f 



(i.) Cook's voyages into the high latitudes of the southern hem- 

 isphere being made when the sun was in the neighborhod of the 

 southern tropic, cannot be referred to as affording information of un- 

 questionable accuracy respecting the winds that prevail in those seas. 



IV. Thunderstorms generally commence between mid-day and sun- 

 set, and move from ivest to east.\ 



* Humboldl's New Spain, Book I, Chap. i'.. See also Poinsett's Mexico, in reo-ard 

 to the violence of these winds. 



i Cook, in Hawkeswoith's Voyiiges, Vol. 2. See al:J0 Cl.iyton's account ol' ihe 

 Falkland islands quoted above. 



t In an p;v.ti'ily direction, not in the [dune ol' the piime verlical. 



