238 Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 



Table VI. — Comets whose Perihelion Distances are greater than 

 001 and less than 0'05. 



Perihelion passage. 



Perihelion 

 distance. 



Longitude of 

 perihelion. 



(1 h 



1. 1689, Nov. 29 4 



2. 1816, March 1 8 



3. 1826, Nov. 18 9 



4. 1847, March 30 6 



5. 1865, Jan. 14 7 



0-0189 

 00485 

 0-0268 

 00425 

 0-0260 



t 



269 41 

 267 35 

 315 31 

 276 2 

 141 ]5 



The perihelion of the first comet in Table VII. is remote from 

 the direction of the sun's motion ; that of the second is distant 

 but 14°, and of the third 21°. 



Table VII. — Comets whose Perihelion Distances are greater than 

 0*05 and less than 0*1. 



Perihelion passnge. 



Perihelion 

 distance. 



Longitude of 

 perihelion. 



d h 



1. 1593, July 18 13 



2. 1780, Sept. 30 22 



3. 1821, March 21 12 



0-0891 

 00963 

 0-0918 



176 19 

 246 35 

 239 29 



With greater perihelion distances the tendency of the perihelia 

 to crowd together around the point indicated is less distinctly marked. 



8. Few comets of small perihelion distance should have their pe- 

 rihelia in the vicinity of longitude^80°, the point opposite to that to- 

 wards which the sun is moving. Accordingly we find, by examin- 

 ing a Table of cometary elements, that with a perihelion distance 

 less than O'l there is not a single perihelion between 35° and 125°, 

 between O'l and 0*2 but 3, and between 0*2 and 0"3 only one. 



Bloomington, Indiana, Sept. 14, 1869. 



ON A POSSIBLE CAUSE OF THE GULP-STREAM. 

 BY ROBERT GILL, ESQ. 



In every part of the equatorial oceans where the waters are free, 

 a current is observed to set from east to west, or against the diur- 

 nal motion of the earth. The waters of the Atlantic in proximity 

 to the equator are thus impelled with a certain velocity upon the 

 eastern coast of South America ; a portion of the equatorial current 

 deviates towards the south, the remaining portion runs along the 

 north-eastern coast of South America and enters into the Gulf of 

 Mexico, whence it finally flows as the Gulf-stream. It appears, 

 therefore, that the Gulf-stream may be considered as a deriva- 

 tion of the equatorial current, and that the latter may be a suffi- 

 cient cause of the former. The direction in w 7 hich the Gulf- 

 stream flows (from south-west to north-east) is accounted for by 

 the fact that, in advancing towards the north, it brings with it the 

 velocity it possessed when further south, and consequently runs faster 



