eo 
1887.] 29 (Haupt. 
tidal component deflected from Cape Hatteras. An inspection 
of any general map of North Carolina reveals the fact that 
instead of the rivers being normal to the coast, they are 
turned for considerable distances back from their mouths into 
a direction nearly parallel with the shore line, and effect their 
discharge under the lee of the Cape, thus conforming to the 
general law of least resistance. 
The capes and bars thus formed by the parallel and con- 
fluent fresh and salt water currents deflect the littoral compo- 
nent until it is met by the direct flood crest and returned to. 
the beach near the middle point of each of the three (8) bays, 
Raleigh’s, Onslow’s and Long’s. Here it is resolved into sec- 
ondary littoral currents along the ellipses thus formed. The 
eastwardly components of these waves compress the ebb chan- 
nels against the eastern shores of the outlets, as at Beaufort, 
N.C., while those to the westward, reinforced by the original 
wave, race along the beach, closing or shoaling the inlets and 
forming with the land drainage the long spits above described. 
The time of high water is also much earlier outside or to the 
eastward of the cape than it is within, in consequence of the 
circuitous route required to be taken by the flood. The 
suction thus produced causes a draft current to the eastward, 
which deflects the ebb discharge from the inlets in this latter 
direction and increases the height of the tides inside the capes. 
It is also a notable fact that a straight line drawn from Cape 
Roman to Hatteras is just tangent to Capes Lookout and Fear, 
and that the transverse and semi-conjugate axes of the ellipses 
of Long and Onslow Bays are respectively equal, while Raleigh 
Bay is somewhat smaller in both directions and has a steeper 
scarp than either of the others (due to the incident wave). 
The shore to the north of Cape Hatteras is deflected from the 
chord of the three bays produced at an angle of 45° for a dis- 
