104 THE OCEAN RIVER 



southward between the Gulf Stream and the coast, but even 

 so they were apparently unaware of the Stream itself. 



If the Corte-Reals noticed the Gulf Stream in their voyages 

 from Labrador to Cuba between 1500 and 1502 they too 

 failed to leave any account. It was characteristic of the early 

 days of Atlantic exploration that navigators kept their obser- 

 vations to themselves as the Phoenicians had before them and 

 rarely passed them on except by word of mouth, so that they 

 did little to help the orderly development of permanent geo- 

 graphical knowledge. For example, Sebastian de Ocampo 

 circumnavigated Cuba in 1509, taking fully eight months to 

 complete the voyage. It is hard to believe that he did not notice 

 the Stream, because he was almost certainly forced to sail 

 against it when he rounded the western point of San Antonio. 

 But he makes no mention of it. 



Once more we turn to Peter Martyr, who gave so much 

 thought and scholarly speculation to the problem of ocean 

 currents. He realized that the stream of water entering the 

 Caribbean must either pass still farther west, through an 

 opening in the mainland into what we now know as the 

 Pacific, or else be diverted to the north. If neither took place 

 then he reasoned that the water must accumulate continu- 

 ously in the western part of the Atlantic. He mentions a more 

 fantastic possibility, that the westward current might be piled 

 high against the western shores or even absorbed into the 

 depths of the earth, but dismisses it with the remark that such 

 a place had not yet been found. Later he also described an 

 argument between Andreas Moralis, the pilot, and Ouidas, 

 who took opposing sides on the question of a westward pas- 

 sage to the Pacific or a northeastern flow of water back into 

 the mid-Atlantic where the currents were supposed to be com- 

 pletely absorbed: 



''As we met thus together there arose a contention between 

 them two as regarding this course of the ocean. They both 



