blessing to scientific men. Raise, then, your standard of academical culture, and recall science to the universities; and the various sciences, while each pursuing its own course independently and unfettered, will at least show respect, as in times of old, to what in old times was called the Art of Arts and the Science of Sciences.

The Rev. Doctor went on to describe the benefits which might be derived by such institutions as the present from a high standard of academic culture, and to remark that our education, in the proper sense of the word, never ceases, and is applicable to eternity as well as to time. He concluded with a hope that the labours may be blessed of those who, in England and Scotland, are endeavouring to raise the standard of academical education. Let us, be said, endeavour to improve and enlarge the sources of instruction-the fountain head; and if we succeed, the waters will flow forth, not only to irrigate the ground immediately beside them, but to "feed and cleanse the cities of the earth, to move the wheels of literature, and to deepen the main sea of the world's knowledge.”

THE RAINBOW.

My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began;

So is it now I am a man ;

So be it when I shall grow old,

Or let me die!

The child is father of the man:
I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.

-WORDSWORTH.

THE WONDERS OF THE OCEAN.

BY

THE DEAN OF CARLISLE.

FROM whatever point of view we look upon the mighty ocean,-whether we gaze upon it on a summer's day, calm and peaceful and "shining glorious, like a silver shield," or in a storm, when its waves are lashed into fury, and rush upon the beach till we are deafened by its roar,-we are equally filled with wonder and delight. But I am not about to speak to you of the poetry, or painting, or beauty of the ocean, or of its wondrous bosom bearing the commerce of the world, or of the fauna and flora of its depths. My aim is to give you a philosophical view of this grand object of contemplation, with which my own mind has been imbued by "Maury's Physical Geography of the Sea."

Lieutenant Maury, of the American Navy, has been for many years in charge of the National Observatory of New York; and his book is the result of many millions of practical observations and experiments in every quarter of the globe. The American Government furnish its Merchant Navy with a log-book, which is carefully filled by the more intelligent captains, and the results of their observations and experiments are communicated to Lieutenant Maury. These relate to the ocean in all its physical features: its surface, its depths, its

currents, its temperature, its saltness, its calms, its storms, its evaporation, its precipitation, its radiation; the inland seas, connected or unconnected with it, how it affects climates and the productions of the earth. From the great difficulties experienced in sounding the ocean, we were unable for many years to ascertain its depth. One English captain believed he had sounded to the depth of ten miles without reaching the bottom; but when the truth came to be known, it was found that the line had been carried to that immense distance by the currents. This great difficulty, however, has been overcome by the very simple invention of a midshipman in the American service: such inventions are all simple when discovered. A cannon ball of 60lb weight is let over the ship's side, dragging after it a line and tackle, so attached that the moment the ball touches the bottom, the line and tackle are released and float to the surface. [The Dean illustrated this part of his subject with great success, by a model of the invention.]

I must confine my remarks upon the ocean almost exclusively to that of the Atlantic, as it contains some features of a more wondrous character than almost any other portion of the sea. First, with regard to the great Gulf Stream. The object of this wonderful current is to fertilise the whole western region of Europe, and make it fit for the habitation of man. Lieutenant Maury describes it as a great river in the ocean. In the severest droughts it never fails; in the mightiest floods it never overflows. It is surrounded on all sides by cold water, while the stream itself is hot. There is not in the world such a magnificent flow of waters; its current is more rapid than the Mississippi or the Amazon, and its volume more than a thousand times greater. So well is this stream defined, that one half a vessel may be seen on it, and the other half on the sea;— so sharp is the line, and such the want of affinity

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between the waters, and reluctance on the part of the Gulf Stream to mingle with the common waters of the sea." The Gulf of Mexico is the cauldron from which this extraordinary stream is supplied. The water comes through the Straits of Florida at no less a temperature than 90 degrees; and what is more wonderful, it sustains its heat for a distance of 3000 miles, and when opposite to Newfoundland the heat is not reduced to less than 75 degrees. This river of hot water, 500 or 600 miles broad, and averaging two miles deep, is constantly rushing through the Atlantic Ocean; the cold water at each side and at the bottom of it. It never touches the bottom, but proceeds through a channel of the ocean, which is as distinctly marked as the bed of any river in the world. It has always been flowing from the coast of America, runs up towards Newfoundland, then turns in a more north-easterly direction, speeds away to the North-eastern Seas, washes the shores of Ireland and Scotland, and even Spitzbergen, but does not encircle England; then turns off southward to the Bay of Biscay, and, taking a south-western course gradually getting cooler and cooler, it meets the equatorial current, and returns as a cold-water river into its cauldron. So has it been rolling round and round, by a wonderful principle of Nature during all these years, and producing the most beneficial effects.

Another remarkable feature of this stream is, that it is a river which not only flows first to the north, then north-east, and then to the east, but the whole body has a horizontal motion upwards and downwards, according to the seasons. In summer, its

course is 4 degrees, or 240 miles south of that which it is in winter. What first led to inquiries upon the Gulf Stream, was, that whales were never found near it; they could not cross the hot water, and were confined to a space the latitude and longitude of which Lieut. Maury has so well marked out, that the poor whales have little chance of escape from their pur

suers.

The Americans (cunning folks that they are) knew the mysteries of the stream twenty years before they let John Bull into the secret. It was observed that the Falmouth packets were always a fortnight behind the American vessels;-the fact being, that the Americans knew where the Gulf Stream was, and took advantage of it in sailing to England. At length Franklin told our government about it. To show the obstinacy of John Bull, when new charts were prepared, and instructions sent to Falmouth that the packets were to take advantage of the Gulf Stream, the captains turned round, and said, "they would not be taught by the Yankees."

The grand object of the Gulf Stream is to carry away from that hot region of the world the superabundant heat, and to bring it to us who stand so much in need of it. It is one of the most beautiful contrivances on a gigantic scale ever presented to the mind of man. The quantity of heat which the stream takes away from the Bay of Honduras, and the Gulf of Mexico, is enough on a winter's day to change winter into summer all over France and Great Britain. The wind blows for nine months over the hot waters, rendering the ocean tepid, and emancipating the British island from ice; whilst the air becomes warm, and sends its pleasant vapours over the whole of the western coasts of these islands. The products of the West Indies are drifted across to these shores; and it is not an uncommon thing to pick them upon the coasts of England, Ireland, and Scotland, while they are never cast on the American shores. The same stream gives the mariner a fair tide; he has a fair tide from America to this country, and a fair tide back by the coldwater stream, which returns inside, or north of the Gulf Stream, in a south-west direction. When ships are covered with frost, and their rigging frozen, they takes place, and they are freed from their shackles have only to steer into the Gulf Stream, when a thaw.