Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas Part 17

Whilst exercising, a clipper ship pa.s.sed at some distance from us, bound to southward and eastward.

CHAPTER x.x.xI.

The Gulf Stream--Darby's Theory--Its ingenuity--The Coasts of America--John Cabot, the Venetian--"_Terra Primum Visa_"--Completion of Cruise--Conclusion.

_Thursday, June 17th._--Have at last got amongst the variable winds, for we struck a breeze yesterday immediately after exercising, and went pitching along at the rate of eight knots before dark. Sea quite rough.

This morning calm again. Have touched the edge of the Gulf Stream, judging from the temperature of the water, and general appearance of the weather. Darby's theory of this current is so learned and philosophical, that I may be excused giving place to it here. In his theme, The Earth, he touches upon this phenomena, and explains it thus: "The earth turns round upon its axis once in twenty-four hours, and consequently fifteen degrees of its meridians revolve hourly; therefore, by multiplying the breadth of any number of degrees of longitude by fifteen, we have the hourly motion of that part of the earth's surface round the axis; as, for example, in lat. 45, a degree of long. is 48-3/4 English miles wide, within a trifling fraction. From these elements, it results that particles of matter on lat. 45 on the surface of the earth, revolve about 630 miles hourly: this is nearly the mean motion, as the maximum at the equator is a fraction less than 1,040 miles hourly, and decreasing along the meridians, until it becomes 0 at either pole."

From this hypothesis he reasons that atmospheric and oceanic ma.s.ses are moved along with the dec.u.mbent nucleus with a velocity decreasing from the equator to the poles; and if the least r.e.t.a.r.dation operates on the atmospheric and oceanic waters, a counter-current will be formed, flowing with the greatest rapidity where the r.e.t.a.r.dation is greatest.

This, he says, occurs along the equator, where the horary motion is at its maximum; and thus the tropic current is formed. This current receives volume and velocity from another cause, which is thus explained: "Immediately under the sun, or where the beams of that luminary are direct, a vacuum is produced, into which the circ.u.mambient air rushes; and as this vacuity is carried westward along the equator, upwards of 1,035 miles hourly, an atmospheric current follows, which, acting on the ocean waters, impels them westward, and adds force and ma.s.s to the tropic current. In the Atlantic Ocean, from the peculiar structure of its sh.o.r.es, a very remarkable phenomenon--the Gulf Stream--is produced. South America, in form an immense triangle, is based on the Pacific, and protrudes its perpendicular angle into the Atlantic at south lat.i.tude 6. This salient point is Cape St. Roque, from which the continent extends to the northwest, crosses the equator, and stretches beyond the northern tropic, forming in the Gulf of Mexico an immense reservoir. Here the continent again turns at right angles, and continues northeast into the northern polar circle. The very deep indenting of the American Continent in the Gulf of Mexico, and the long line of coast from its recesses into the southern section of the torrid zone, is in a peculiar manner calculated to produce that very reflux, which const.i.tutes the largest whirlpool on the globe."

Much more does this ingenious writer advance, but my limits prevent its insertion here, and the subject is not exactly in accordance with the tenor of my task. Suffice it for the present, that upon this day, the 18th of June, we have pa.s.sed over this equatorial current, and are now heading for our native sh.o.r.es, and are in the waters made cla.s.sic by the glorious endeavors of the early navigators. Strange is it that of all those who sought this coast, the name of John Cabot, the first adventurer who landed upon it, should be so seldom mentioned: and History, called by a philosopher a Splendid Lie, should prove its t.i.tle to mendacity, by giving all the glory of the land, "_primum visa_" to his son, Sebastian. To John Cabot, a Venetian, then a merchant of Bristol, England, in the reign of the Seventh Henry, is all the honor to be ascribed of setting the first European foot upon the then desert wilds that now bloom, the Garden of the United States; and if a name must be derived from the discoverer, without reference to its euphony, to descend as a patronymic, by such a rule, we should be called Cabotians, instead of Yankees, United Staters, or by the Vespucian t.i.tle of Americans.

But to Columbus attaches all the fame of the original idea of navigating the Western Seas, and if he did not set foot upon the sh.o.r.es towards which we are now sailing, his voyage incited others to undertake what perhaps would never otherwise have been dreamed of, and the tropics would long after have remained painted in their imaginations as a circle of fire in which the Salamander sported. About a year after the Genoese had returned from his first voyage--I quote from an Italian, Tiraboschi--the merchant of Bristol appears to have embraced the idea that new lands might be discovered in the North West, and a pa.s.sage to India might be brought to light by this course. And, in answer to his application, on the 5th of March, 1495, King Henry the Seventh granted a commission to John Cabot and his three sons, Louis, Sebastian, and Sanchez. And on the 24th of June, 1497, he discovered that part of this Continent, which he called "_Terra primum Visa_" nearly a year previous to the discovery of the country south of the Isthmus of Darien. But, _satis superque_, we have had almost enough of ships and the sea. Our prow is directed towards our own loved sh.o.r.es; the southern gales waft us propitiously on them; with each swell of the ocean, our bosoms heave in unison, our hearts leap forwards with our gallant barque, over every obstructing wave:

"Bend, bend, ye lithe and quivering spars, Point home my country's stripes and stars."

It is evening, and yon setting sun, whose course we have tracked from the lonely anchorage in the Typa, down the China Seas, across the Indian Ocean, and over the wide expanse of the Atlantic, sinks slowly to night behind the mountains of our own broad and beautiful land. They gild the spire of an ancient village church, beneath which, in the days that are no more, our youthful ears drank in the kindly teachings of the gray-headed and venerable man, now forming one of the congregation that sleeps beneath the green sod surrounding it. They gild, with a golden tint, the attic windows of an old homestead, behind the small panes of which, there came to us once, more golden, but equally unsubstantial, visions, when our hearts, untravelled, sank to slumbers light and sweet.

Ere its next setting, have hopes that the telegraph wires will convey thither the glad news of our safe return.

We have taken a pilot on board; the chain cables are ranged forward on either gangway, bent to the anchors, ready for letting go; the changing color of the water denotes soundings, and every thing indicates we shall soon be in.

Patient reader, my Cruise is completed. Its preparation has beguiled me of many a monotonous hour at sea. If either at sea or on sh.o.r.e it be, in this manner beneficial to you, I shall be satisfied. We must part. I bid you adieu, with a feeling towards you as if you had been my _compagnon du voyage_; and fervently wish that your Cruise of Life may be over placid seas, to pleasant ports, and always in company with kind and generous friends.

THE END.