Page:Physical Geography of the Sea and its Meteorology.djvu/239

Rh not give birth to regular tides. Indeed, the existence of these tides, with the immense flow and drift which annually take place from the polar seas into the Atlantic, suggests many conjectures concerning the condition of these unexplored regions. Whale-men have always been puzzled as to the place of breeding for the right whale. It is a cold-water animal, and, following up this train of thought, the question is prompted, Is not the nursery for the great whale in this polar sea, which has been so set about and hemmed in with a hedge of ice that man may not trespass there? This providential economy is still farther suggestive, prompting us to ask, Whence comes the food for the young whales there? Do the teeming waters of the Gulf Stream (§ 160) convey it there also, and in channels so far down in the depths of the sea that no enemy may waylay and spoil it on the long journey? Seals were sporting and water-fowl feeding in this open sea of Dr. Kane's. Its waves came rolling in at his feet, and dashing with measured tread, like the majestic billows of old ocean, against the shore. Solitude, the cold and boundless expanse, and the mysterious heavings of its green waters, lend their charm to the scene. They suggested fancied myths, and kindled the ardent imagination of the daring mariner's many longings. The temperature of its waters was only 36°! Such warm water could get there from the south only as a current far down in the depths below. The bottom of the ice of this eighty miles of barrier was no doubt many—perhaps hundreds of—feet below the surface level. Under this ice there was also doubtless water above the freezing-point.

430. Under currents change temperature slowly.—Now need the presence of warm water within the arctic circle excite suprise, when we recollect that the cold waters of the frigid zone are transferred to the torrid without changing their temperature perhaps more than 7° or 8° by the way. This transfer of cold waters for a part of the way may take place on the surface, and until the polar flow (§ 89) dips down and becomes submarine. At any rate, officers on the Coast Survey have found water at the bottom of the Gulf Stream, in latitude 25° 30' X., as low in temperature as 35°. Now, if water flowing out of the polar basin at the temperature of 28° may, by passing along the secret paths of the sea, reach the Gulf of Mexico in summer at a temperature of only 3° above the freezing-point of fresh water, why may not water leaving the torrid zone at a temperature of 82°, and