122 THE OCEAN RIVER 



by the breathing of Demo-gorgon as some have imagined, 

 because they see the seas increase and decrease, flowe and 

 reflowe/' 



Fortunately, with the slow advance of physical science, it 

 was inevitable that speculation should become more closely 

 confined by the ascertainable facts. Even so, such an unques- 

 tionably able scientist as Kepler was handicapped by the limi- 

 tations of contemporary scientific theory. He saw the equa- 

 torial waters being left behind in the west by the eastward 

 rotation of the earth just as a passenger in a rapidly accelerat- 

 ing railroad train finds himself impelled to the rear of the car. 

 Varenius summarized this view when in 1650 he wrote: ". . . 

 the movement of our globe contributes not a little toward it, 

 because the water, not being adherent to the earth, but only in 

 a loose contact with it, cannot follow the quickness of its 

 motion toward the east, but is left behind toward the west, so 

 that the sea does not move from one part to the other, but on 

 the contrary it is the earth which quits or leaves the parts of 

 the sea, one after the other.'' It did not occur to Kepler and 

 Varenius that even if the earth's movement did generate the 

 westward drift of equatorial waters in this manner it would not 

 fit in with the eastward currents across the northern part of the 

 ocean. 



The similarity in westward movement of the Equatorial 

 Current, of the trade winds, and of the apparent movement of 

 the stars, which was so obvious and significant to Columbus 

 and his contemporaries, continued to impress itself on the sci- 

 entific mind, and a number of conflicting theories were offered 

 to account for it. Isaac Vossius wrote an entire volume, en- 

 titled De Motu Marium et Ventorum, on the relation of wind 

 and sea. The sun draws the morning mist into rising vapor, 

 and in like manner he believed that its greater tropical heat 

 attracts the equatorial ocean toward it in a long mountain of 

 water whose flanks are steep enough to impede vessels attempt- 



