Page:Physical Geography of the Sea and its Meteorology.djvu/91

 Rh supplies its shores (§ 283) more abundantly with vapour than the North Atlantic does. This no doubt assists to make furious and more frequent the storms of the North Pacific.

172. Position of the poles of maximum cold, and their influence upon the meteorology of these two oceans.—Some philosophers hold that there are in the northern hemisphere two poles of maximum cold: the Asiatic, near the intersection of the parallel of 80° with the meridian of 120° E., and the American, near lat. 79° and long. 100° W. The Asiatic pole is the colder. The distance between it and the Japan Current is about 1500 miles; the distance between the other pole and the Gulf Stream is about 2000 miles. The bringing of the heat of summer, as these two streams do, in such close juxtaposition with the cold of winter, cannot fail to produce violent commotions in the atmosphere. These commotions, as indicated by the storms, are far more frequent and violent in winter, when the contrasts between the warm and cool places are greater, than they are in summer, when those contrasts are least. Moreover, each of those poles is to the north-west of its ocean, the quarter whence come the most terrific gales of winter. Whatever be the exact degree of influence which future research may show to be exercised by these cool places, and the heat dispensed so near them by these mighty streams of tepid water, there is reason to believe that they do act and react upon each other with no inconsiderable meteorological power. In winter the Gulf Stream carries the temperature of summer as far north as the Grand Banks of Newfoundland.

173. Climates of England and silver fogs of Newfoundland.—The habitual dampness of the climate of the British Islands, as well as the occasional dampness of that along the Atlantic coasts of the United States when easterly winds prevail, is attributable also to the Gulf Stream. These winds come to us loaded with vapours gathered from its warm and smoking waters. The Gulf Stream carries the temperature of summer, even in the dead of winter, as far north as the Grand Banks of Newfoundland, and there maintains it in the midst of the severest frosts. It is the presence of this warm water and a cold atmosphere in juxtaposition there which gives rise to the "silver fogs" of Newfoundland, one of the most beautiful phenomena to be seen anywhere among the treasures of the frost-king.

174. Influences upon storms.—The influence which the Gulf