590 



Dr. W. B. Carpenter on the 



[June 13, 



rate than " diffusion " can counterbalance without any vertical circulation 

 in the water itself, and thus tends to render the depths of that Sea unin- 

 habitable, the absence of the like source of impurity in the water of the 

 Red Sea may be expected to leave its abyssal water in a condition fit to 

 support a moderate amount of Animal life ; since the process of " diffusion," 

 even without a vertical circulation, will maintain a certain amount of inter- 

 change of gases between the superficial and the deep strata. 



84. These views are suggested merely as fair inferences from our present 

 very limited knowledge, to be confirmed or set aside by the results of future 

 inquiries. I have experienced, in the course of the researches in which it has 

 been my privilege to be engaged, so much advantage from the clues which 

 have offered themselves from time to time for their guidance, that I should 

 consider myself wanting in my duty to those who may hereafter take up 

 the same line of investigation, if I were to be kept back from making such 

 suggestions, by any apprehension that my personal credit would suffer from 

 having propounded ideas which subsequent research did not bear out. — 

 "Truth," it has been well said, " emerges out of Error, rather than out of 

 Chaos ;" and the history of Science is full of instances in which erroneous 

 doctrines have been more 'productive, because more suggestive, than well- 

 determined facts that open no access to the Unknown beyond. 



Addenda. 



As this sheet is passing through the press, I have been kindly supplied 

 by Mr. Scott, Director of the Meteorological Department, with the follow- 

 ing extract from a letter received from Prof. Mohn, Director of the Meteoro- 

 logical Institute at Christiania, giving an account of some observations re- 

 cently made by him during his voyage of inspection of the Meteorological 

 Stations on the Norwegian coast : — 



" On my voyage I have taken the opportunity of making deep-sea tem- 

 perature observations in the Throndhjem Fjord and the Sogne Fjord. 

 I found exactly what I expected. You know our Fjoids are deep in their 

 middle part, and shallower at their mouth. In the deep part of the fjords 

 the lower part of the water — say from 40 fathoms downwards — is of a con- 

 stant temperature of 6° to 6°'5 Cent. [43° to 44° Fahr.]. So I found in 

 the Sogne Fjord, 16° [61° Fahr.] on the surface, 6°*4 in 10 fathoms, and 

 not lower than 6°*5 in different depths down to 700 fathoms. Of course 

 the Casella-Miller's thermometer was used. This agrees with the results 

 found by myself in the Throndhjem Fjord, and with those found in the 

 Hardanger Fjord by Prof. Seue, and by the survey-steamer ' Hansteen ' (?), 

 Capt. Wylle. In those two fjords the constant temperature commenced 

 in a depth of about 40-50 fathoms, and was six degrees and some 

 tenths Centigrade. Lieutenant A. W. Midler, the Commander of the 

 steamer running between Bergen and Iceland, has found this summer, by 



