226 EIGHTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT ON THE STATE CABINET. 



lY. VIEW OF STORMS AND THEIR LAWS. 



The remarks before made on the course of some storms may render a more 

 general discussion appropriate. 



By the diurnal and annual revolutions of the earth, the sun's action upon 

 our atmosphere must be very unequal and changeable : other causes co- 

 operate, and atmospheric currents are the result. The directions of these 

 currents may be much modified by the configuration of land and ocean, the 

 course of mountain ranges, and the situation of deserts ; but atmospheric 

 stability must be impossible, though the irregularities maybe confined with- 

 in moderate limits. Perfect stability would be complete stagnation ; a result 

 which Divine Providence designed to prevent by the operation of established 

 laws, and which we all see to be fully accomplished. 



Over a large part of the United States between the Atlantic and the 

 Rocky mountains, and of Btitish America also east of the same range, the 

 great storms and violent changes of weather begin with moderate wind from 

 some point between northeast and southeast, and in some places southwest. 

 Ultimately the course changes, and the strong westerly wind carries the 

 storm to the east. The general or controlling current of our winds is thus 

 shown to be from the west. 



The same is shown by the direction of the clouds, and the more splendid- 

 ly if there are two tiers of the higher clouds, and that too when there is 

 no storm in action ; so that often, for some da.js after the storm, the high 

 clouds come generally from some point a little south of west, whatever may 

 be the surface current of the local winds. More than half the time the sur- 

 face winds have the same, or nearly the same, direction as the clouds. This 

 has been shown by thousands of observations over a great extent of country ; 

 so that a width or zone of nearly thirty degrees of latitude, and extending 

 to sixty degrees north latitude, is proved to have this general current of 

 wind from the west or between northwest and southwest. These are great 

 facts ; and the solution is clear. The observations collected by Professor 

 Coffin sustain his conclusion that this belt of westerly wind encircles the 

 northern hemisphere. For the present, we need only the fact on this part of 

 North America. 



From the cause of the trade-winds within the tropics, their current 

 sweeps across the Caribbean sea into the Grulf of Mexico, augmented by the 

 wind from the northeast towards the equator, and by the wind from the 

 southeast on the south side of the equator. Examination of the map of the 

 northeast part of South America shows that coast to be most favorably si- 

 tuated for the easy ingress of the southern trade-wind to the Grulf of Mexico. 

 This whole volume, below the mountain-tops, is arrested at the west by the 

 high range which passes along the Isthmus west of the Caribbean sea and 

 the Grulf of Mexico, and becomes the Rocky mountains of the north. This 

 range is well situated to direct the winds from the Gulf considerably west 

 of north towards British America, as its general course is from Lat. 20° N. 



