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Part III. — Fifteenth Annual Report 



it blew variably and not very strong, mostly from the north-west and 

 north-east, until the 25th when it blew strong from the east, and the 

 next day from the south east, which would tend to drive the drifters 

 ashore where they were found. 



The other two are of special interest. They were put into the water on 

 29th December 1896, one about 14 miles S.E. by E. of Duncansby Head, 

 and the other nearly midway between Duncansby Head and Rattray 

 Head. They were found on the 3rd and 6th February 1897, on the 

 coast of Aberdeen, and on the 21st February, it is important to notice, 

 another drifter thrown into the sea with the first named (off Duncansby 

 Head) was picked up on Sanda, one of the northern of the Orkney Isles. 

 There is little doubt that all three drifters had at first gone south and 

 east, and were off the east coast of Scotland when they were overtaken 

 by the movement following the violent E.N.E. gales towards the latter 

 part of January 1897, which drove the surface water northwards along 

 the coast ; two of them were stranded on the corner of the coast of 

 Aberdeen, while the third continued its course northward, and was 

 caught on Start Point, Orkney, fifteen or sixteen days later. This 

 reversal of the usual course of the surface water puzzled me in some 

 other cases also, as it was the first time it had been observed since the 

 experiments were begun in September 1894, and I thought at first some 

 error had been made in the numbering of the bottles, or in recording 

 the place where they had been put into the sea ; but I soon obtained 

 satisfactory evidence that the unusual northward movement extended 

 along the whole east coast of England and Scotland, from Norfolk to 

 Shetland, and that it was a rapid movement. The fact that it was 

 largely caused by strong gales blowing from the E.N.E., is apparently 

 due to the physical configuration of the coasts and bottom of the North 

 Sea, and will be dealt with later. 



The circumstance that no bottles put into the Moray Firth were found 

 on any other part of the east coast of Scotland, or on the coasts of Eng- 

 land or Denmark, while they were found on the south-west coast of 

 Norway and on the west coast of Sweden, points at first sight to the 

 deflection of the current eastwards and not southwards, by the barrier 

 opposed to it by the coast of Banff and Aberdeen. But that it also goes 

 south as well as east is shown (1) by the evidence given below as to the 

 course taken by the drifters put into the sea off the east coast of Aber- 

 deen and further south ; (2) by the fact that one of the Moray Firth 

 drifters was picked up at sea by a fishing-smack far to the south, between 

 Flamborough Head and the Dogger Bank, about sixty miles off the York- 

 shire coast ; and (3) by the time taken for the floats to reach the Continent. 

 The marked retrocession of the stretch of coast between the Moray 

 Firth and Fife is also of importance in this connection. The drifter 

 referred to as having been picked up by a fishing-smack was a wooden 

 one, which was set adrift with others on the 22nd July 1896, near the 

 dividing line previously described, and, therefore, well within the Firth. 

 Two others of the same lot were picked up on the south coast of the Moray 

 Firth, oneon the 24th, near Macduff, Banffshire, and the other on the 

 23th, about ten miles further east. The third cleared the point and then 

 moved in a mean S. by E. £ E. direction for a distance of about 220 

 miles; and, as it was floating for 104 days and travelled altogether nearly 

 250 miles, its mean rate was rather under 2 J miles per day. It was 

 picked up on 3rd December in lat. 54° 35' N. long. 1° 20' E. about 

 65 miles N.E. by E. from Spurn Point, and was no doubt on its way to 

 the Continent. During the period of flotation the effective winds blew 

 in August on the Scotch coast from W. by N. and W.N.W. j on the 



