Marvels of the Universe 899 
wide rather than long and narrow. It is to be found in the Mediterranean and is particularly 
plentiful in the Bay of Naples, where the fishermen have likened it to a gleaming sword and given it 
the name of sabre de mer. 
THE WIND 
BY F. W. HENKEL, B.A., F.R.A.S. 
Tue Wind, that potent, invisible agent whose variability is in common parlance a synonym for all 
that is most changeable, is of importance in more ways than one. Though even yet our knowledge 
of the movements of the vast atmospheric ocean at the bottom of which we dwell is very imperfect, 
by the observations of meteorologists all over the world a considerable body of important informa- 
tion has been obtained as to the main features of its circulation both in the lower and in the upper 
regions. The action of the Wind as a determining, perhaps the main, factor in the important move- 
ments of the ocean known as currents, its influence as a geological agent in promoting and assisting 
the weathering of the rocks and in removing abraded material from one place to another, piling it 
up as loess, sand dunes, etc., will also come in for our consideration in this brief sketch. 
Though in our own country, as we have already mentioned, the very name of Wind is usually 
regarded as a symbol for all that is variable, yet there is nevertheless a certain amount of regularity 
init unsuspected by the chance observer. In England and over Western Europe generally, the south- 
Photo by] - z ; " pala . R. Ba a 
WIND MARKINGS ON SNOW. 
Very beautiful are the ridges and patterns made by the Wind on the soft surface of the Alpine snow-fields. Sometimes the 
snow is swept into long ridges, an effect that results from a strong and persistent Wind. Here the uneven surface of the snow 
is due to a strong and choppy wind. 
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