176 
HAYDEN. 
a parabolic track concave to the east, with a marked ten¬ 
dency to follow the Gulf Stream. Speaking of the origin of 
these terrific storms, Padre Vines, the eminent director of 
the Observatory of Belen College, Havana, says: 
“ To the east of the Windward Islands and along the Carib¬ 
bean Sea is planted a cyclonic battery which in certain 
months of the year aims its death-dealing projectiles at us— 
projectiles of incalculable destructive power and prodigious 
range.” He says further, and to this I would call especial 
attention: “ The position and aim of the battery that is 
planted to fire upon us, the range of its shots, and even the 
destructive force of its projectiles, all depend upon general 
causes that vary, more or less, with the seasons; hence the 
cyclone commonly takes a path that varies with the months.” 
Here, then, we have a general law, a key that opens the 
door to the solution of problems of the greatest interest and 
importance to the' physicist, to the meteorologist, and to the 
practical navigator. Briefly stated, Vines’ laws regarding 
the recurvature of West Indian hurricanes are as follows: In 
June (and October) the vertex of the parabola is in about 
latitude 20° to 23° north; in July (and September), 27° to 
29°, and in August, 30° to 32°. The importance of these 
laws is so great, both theoretically and practically, and the 
authority of their discoverer so well established, that they 
are worthy of the most careful consideration and are not to 
be denied on the strength of any series of storm tracks that 
has yet been published. 
Let us consider next the conditions that precede the forma¬ 
tion of a hurricane. To do this let us imagine ourselves 
aboard ship in the tropics, near the northern limits of the 
belt of equatorial rains and calms, and watch the weather. 
I will quote from “Two Years before the Mast,” by R. H. 
Dana, Jr., a little book whose interest, truthfulness, and 
descriptive power are so great that many successive editions 
have been published since its first appearance, some fifty 
years ago: 
