90 PROFESSOR FORBES’ INQUIRIES 
northern hemisphere, as it certainly renders the climate colder up to latitude 
423°, ought beyond that parallel to have a contrary effect, such as the rapidly 
diminishing numbers in the last column of Table V. also indicate.* 
Conclusions. 
44. Although it might be possible to alter the table of comparisons between 
theory and observation (Table III., par. 34), by a slight modification of the for- 
mula of (33), so as to appear more favourable to our hypothesis, I will not here 
attempt to do so. I shall be satisfied if I have indicated a method of taking 
account of the physical features of the globe in relation to climate, in such a 
manner as more accurate and extended data will enable future writers to render 
still more exact. 
45. Indeed, the trials which I have made to modify the form, or the constants 
in the formula of temperature, have satisfied me that it cannot at present be mate- 
rially improved ; since what is gained in accuracy in some one point of view is 
lost in another. 
46. The anomalies still indicated in the fourth column of Table II. must 
therefore for the present remain. Only, it may be remarked, that some of them 
may disappear by a more correct estimate of the mean temperature of the paral- 
lels. In particular, I cannot but think that the temperature corresponding to 60° 
N. latitude will be found to be too high. It is quite impossible to express, by 
any ordinary continuous law, the gradation given in M. Dove's table for the 
neighbourhood of the 60th parallel, taken in connection with higher and lower 
latitudes. Nor is there any peculiarity in the distribution of land and water which 
seems likely to account for this, unless it be the sudden closure of the Pacific 
Ocean a little beyond that latitude, where the Asiatic and-American continents so 
nearly touch. The apparent anomaly may indeed be entirely owing to a defi- 
ciency in our information as to the temperature of the atmosphere over the 
oceanic portions of the globe, which in those latitudes is peculiarly liable to be 
affected by powerful currents of hot and cold water, as has been already stated. 
47. To the presence of these currents must also be ascribed the fact, that 
the “ Thermic Anomaly” does not anywhere vanish (as it is assumed to do some- 
where near the 45th degree), and that, consequently, about the parallels of 40° 
and 50°, we find in a few places of the globe mean temperatures higher or lower 
than those indicated in the two last columns of Table III., as corresponding to the 
extreme statical conditions of an entire predominance of land or water. In 
higher or lower latitudes the ‘‘Thermic Anomaly” will be found to be between 
the limits indicated by those two columns, the oceanic limit being, however, 
* “Up to 40° south latitude the temperature of the southern hemisphere is lower than that of the 
northern ; this may not be the case in higher latitudes.” Dovs,— The Distribution of Heat, &c., p. 15. 
