Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

5. _Khamsin_, _Samiel_, _Simoom_, _Harmattan_, _Sirocco_. These are local titles of winds differing greatly in geographical position and direction, and also in some of their properties, but prevalent in desert regions, or in countries adjacent to them, and having one universal character of being hot blasts. The Khamsin is a hot south wind, which soon after the vernal equinox begins to blow in Egypt, continuing at intervals during a period of about fifty days, to which the name refers. The two next are entirely identical, the Samiel being the name given by the Turks to the wind which the Arabs called the Simoom. It is common in Syria, Arabia, and Nubia, deleterious in its mildest forms, occasionally destructive, many a pilgrim to the shrine of the Prophet at Mecca, and merchant to the marts of Bagdad, having perished by its noxious suffocating influence. Bruce suffered from it when ascending the Nile, he and his company becoming so enervated as to be incapable of pitching their tents, oppressed as well by an intolerable headache. “The poisonous simoom,” he remarks, when at Chendi, “blew as if it came from an oven; our eyes were dim, our lips cracked, our knees tottering, our throats perfectly dry; and no relief was found from drinking an immoderate quantity of water.” The most complete account of the simoom and its effects has been given by Volney, whose accuracy here has been repeatedly confirmed. “Travelers,” he states, “have mentioned these winds under the name of poisonous winds; or, more correctly, hot winds of the desert. Such in fact is their quality; and their heat is sometimes so excessive that it is difficult to form an idea of their violence without having experienced it; but it may be compared to the heat of a large oven at the moment of drawing out the bread. When these winds begin to blow, the atmosphere assumes an alarming aspect. The sky, at other times so clear in this climate, becomes dark and heavy; the sun loses its splendor, and appears of a violet color. The air is not cloudy, but gray and thick; and is in fact filled with an extremely subtle dust, that penetrates everywhere. This wind, always light and rapid, is not at first remarkably hot, but it increases in heat in proportion as it continues. All animated bodies soon discover it by the change it produces in them. The lungs, which a too rarefied air no longer expands, are contracted and become painful. Respiration is short and difficult, the skin parched and dry, and the body consumed by an internal heat. In vain is recourse had to large draughts of water; nothing can restore perspiration. In vain is coolness sought for; all bodies in which it is usual to find it deceive the hand that touches them. Marble, iron, water, notwithstanding the sun no longer appears, are hot. The streets are deserted, and the dead silence of night reigns everywhere. The inhabitants of towns and villages shut themselves up in their houses—and those of the desert in their tents, or in pits they dig in the earth—where they wait the termination of this destructive heat. It usually lasts three days, but if it exceeds that time it becomes insupportable. Wo to the traveler whom this wind surprises remote from shelter! he must suffer all its dreadful consequences, which sometimes are mortal. The danger is most imminent when it blows in squalls, for then the rapidity of the wind increases the heat to such a degree as to cause sudden death. This death is a real suffocation; the lungs being empty are convulsed, the circulation disordered, and the whole mass of blood driven by the heat toward the head and breast; whence that hæmorrhage at the nose and mouth which happens after death. This wind is especially fatal to persons of a plethoric habit, and those in whom fatigue has destroyed the tone of the muscles and vessels. The corpse remains a long time warm, swells, turns blue, and is easily separated; all of which are signs of that putrid fermentation which takes place when the humors become stagnant. These accidents are to be avoided by stopping the nose and mouth with handkerchiefs; an efficacious method is also that practiced by the camels, who bury their noses in the sand, and keep them there till the squall is over. Another quality of this wind is its extreme aridity, which is such, that water sprinkled upon the floor evaporates in a few minutes. By this extreme dryness it withers and strips all the plants, and by exhaling too suddenly the emanations from animal bodies, crisps the skin, closes the pores, and causes that feverish heat which is the invariable effect of suppressed perspiration.” The current of the simoom is seldom of any considerable breadth, but different examples of it have been traversing a tract of country of but scanty area at the same time, and several cases of disaster from it upon an extensive scale are upon record. The opinion is now commonly held, that the destruction of the Assyrian army, when

“The angel of death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
And their hearts but once heaved, and forever grew still,”

was accomplished by the agency of the simoom, directed by the Almighty Will over the host of Senacherib—an interpretation which the terms of the prophetic announcement of the avenging stroke remarkably support: “Behold I will send a blast upon him.”

The Harmattan, a periodical hot wind from the desert, differs remarkably from the simoom. It blows from the interior of the great Sahara, from the north-east, over Senegambia and Guinea, to that part of the coast of Africa lying between Cape Verde in 15° north latitude to Cape Lopez in 1° south latitude, a coast line of upward of two thousand miles. It occurs during December, January, and February, generally three or four times in that season. The harmattan is the local name of the wind among the Fantees, a nation on the Gold Coast. It comes on indiscriminately at any hour of the day, at any time of the tide, or at any period of the moon, continuing sometimes only a day or two, at other times five or six days, and it has been known to last upward of a fortnight. A fog or haze is one of the peculiarities which always accompanies this wind, occasioning a gloom which frequently renders even near objects obscure, through which the sun appears for a short time about noon, having a wild red aspect. Though the wind blows out to sea for ten or twelve leagues, the fog is confined to the land, and leaves a deposition of fine whitish particles upon the grass and trees. Extreme dryness is another property of the harmattan. No dew falls during its continuance, nor is there the least appearance of moisture in the atmosphere. Vegetables of every kind suffer; all tender plants and most of the productions of the garden are destroyed; the grass withers, and becomes dry like hay; vigorous evergreens feel the pernicious influence; the branches of the lemon, orange, and lime trees droop, the leaves become flaccid, and so parched as to be easily rubbed to dust between the fingers, should the harmattan blow for several successive days. Among other extraordinary effects of the extreme dryness, it is stated, that the covers of books, though closely shut up in a trunk, are bent as if they had been exposed to a fire. Household furniture cracks, the panels of the doors split, and any veneered work flies to pieces. Another, and the most striking feature of the harmattan, is its salubrity. Though prejudicial to vegetable life, and occasioning disagreeable parching effects on the human species, yet it is highly conducive to health, those laboring previously under fevers generally recover during its prevalence, the feeble gain strength, and malignant diseases disappear. It seems that as this wind immediately follows the rainy season on the African coast, during which diseases are induced by an excess of moisture, the harmattan, invested with extraordinary dryness, removes humidity from the atmosphere, and counteracts its effects.

The Sirocco is analogous to the Khamsin, but milder. It is a hot south-east wind prevailing in the Mediterranean, in Italy and Sicily, but felt most violently in the country around Naples, and at Palermo. It sometimes commences faintly about the summer solstice, but blows occasionally with great force in the month of July. Mr. Brydone, writing from Palermo, and referring to July 8th, observes—

“On Sunday, we had the long-expected sirocco wind, which, although our expectations had been raised pretty high, yet I own greatly exceeded them. Friday and Saturday were uncommonly cool, the mercury never being higher than 72½: and, although the sirocco is said to have set in early on Sunday morning, the air in our apartments, which are very large, with high ceilings, was not in the least affected by it at eight o’clock, when I rose. I opened the door without having any suspicion of such a change, and, indeed, I never was more astonished in my life. The first blast of it on my face felt like the burning steam from the mouth of an oven. I drew back my head and shut the door, calling out to Fullarton that the whole atmosphere was in a flame. However, we ventured to open another door that leads to a cool platform, where we usually walk; this was not exposed to the wind, and here I found the heat much more supportable than I could have expected from the first specimen I had of it at the other door. It felt somewhat like the subterraneous sweating-stoves at Naples, but still much hotter. In a few minutes, we found every fibre greatly relaxed, and the pores opened to such a degree, that we expected soon to be thrown into a profuse sweat. I went to examine the thermometer, and found the air in the room as yet so little affected that it stood only at 73. The preceding night it was at 72½. I took it out in the open air, when it immediately rose to 110, and soon after to 112; and I am confident, that in our old lodgings, or anywhere within the city, it must have risen several degrees higher. The air was thick and heavy, but the barometer was little affected—it had fallen only about a line. The sun did not once appear the whole day, otherwise I am persuaded the heat must have been insupportable; on that side of our platform which is exposed to the wind, it was with difficulty we could bear it for a few minutes. Here I exposed a little pomatum, which was melted down as if I had laid it before the fire. I attempted to take a walk in the street, to see if any creature was stirring, but I found it too much for me, and was glad to get up stairs again. This extraordinary heat continued till three o’clock in the afternoon, when the wind changed at once, almost to the opposite point of the compass.” All nature languishes under the influence of this wind: vegetation droops and withers; the Italians suffering from it not less than strangers. When any feeble literary production appears, the strongest phrase of disapprobation they can bestow is—_era scritto in temps del sirocco_, “it was written in the time of the sirocco.” There can be little doubt but that this hot south-east wind sweeps across the Mediterranean from the shores of Africa. It is some compensation that the season of this oppressive blast is also that of the north-east Etesian winds, and not unfrequently, after a few hours’ experience of the enfeebling influence of the sirocco, the tramontane—or north wind—follows with its invigorating breath.

Hot winds, resembling the sirocco of Sicily and Italy, prevail in New South Wales, and are supposed to derive their heat from tracts of unknown deserts in the intertropical regions of that island-continent. “One might almost fancy,” says Mrs. Meredith, “the Ancient Mariner to have experienced one during his ghostly voyage, he so accurately describes their aspect—

All in a hot and copper sky,
The bloody sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the moon.

The sirocco of that country always blows from the north-west. At Sydney, its oven-like temperature is moderated by the mid-day sea-breeze; but in the interior it is severely felt, and is often fatal to the vegetation. Every green thing droops and dies, dried up like half-burnt paper. Large tracts of cultivated land, covered with luxuriant green crops of wheat or barley, just going into ear, are scorched, shriveled, and absolutely blackened by the heat, and become fit for nothing but to be cut as litter; and of course the delicate plants and flowers of the gardens are not spared by the “burning breath of the fervid Air-king.”

6. _Hurricanes._—Sudden and tremendous bursts of storm are common in mountainous districts, and in the plains which lie at the base of those vast piles of nature’s building. Their peaks, exposed by elevation to intense cold, and covered with perpetual snow, cool and condense the warm air rising up from the regions below, which descends with an impetus proportioned to its own gravity and the lighter condition of the air over the regions below, and a tempest ensues upon considerable condensation and rarefaction in adjoining regions of the atmosphere. This is the origin of the _pamperos_, or south-west winds, which rush from the snows of the Andes, and sweeping over the level pampas with unchecked violence, become hurricanes before their arrival at Buenos Ayres, and carry to the city clouds of dust collected from the plains, occasioning almost total darkness in the streets. So sudden is the operation of the pampero, that persons bathing in the river Plate have been drowned by the agitation of its waters, through the tempest, before they could possibly reach the shore. Captain Fitzroy relates, when in his ship upon the river, that a small boat had been hauled ashore above high-water mark, and fastened with a strong rope to a large stone; but the pampero set in, and afterward the boat was found far from the beach, shattered to pieces, but still fast to the stone, which it had dragged along.

But this violent movement of the atmosphere is remarkably beneficial in its general effect to the inhabitants of the pampas of Buenos Ayres and on the banks of the Plata. The prevailing winds through a great part of the year are northerly; and these passing over extensive marshy tracts bring with them a degree of humidity, which renders the land rife with fever and pestilence, till the pampero rushes down from the Andes and clears the atmosphere. A somewhat similar wind is one of our own physical phenomena, hitherto unexplained, to the violence of which the tourist to the Cumberland lakes may occasionally be exposed in spring and autumn. This is the Helm-wind. Hutchinson, in the history of the county, and the Rev. J. Watson, in a report to the British Association, have given an account of its singular features. When not a breath of air is stirring, or a cloud is to be seen, a line of clouds will be suddenly formed over the summits of the lofty ridge of mountains at Hartside, extending several miles on the western side. To this collection of vapors the term Helm is applied from its shape. It exhibits an awful and solemn appearance, spreading a gloom over the regions below, like the shadows of night. Parallel to this, another line of clouds, called the Bar, begins to form. The two lines unite together at their extremities, and embrace between them an elliptical cloudless space, from half a mile to four or five miles in breadth, and from eight to thirty miles in length; the breadth being from east to west, and the length from north to south. Soon after the complete formation of the Helm-bar, a violent wind issues from the space between the clouds, generally blowing directly from the east, and with such power that trees have been dismantled of their foliage, stacks of grain dispersed, and heavy vehicles overturned. The Helm-wind has continued for as much as nine days together, with a noise resembling that of a violent sea-storm, but it is seldom accompanied with any rain. It has been suggested, that the air from the coast of Northumberland, being cooled as it rises to the summit of the mountains, and there condensed, descends from thence with great force, by its gravity, into the district, to the west of Hartside, the scene of the phenomenon: but obviously a variety of other causes must enter into its production.

In several parts of the globe, an extensive vacuum being suddenly created in the atmosphere by the agency of electricity, the surrounding air rushes in with immense impetuosity from all points of the compass, blowing in gusts of resistless power, destroying all the productions of the earth, leveling forests and the finest buildings, and inundating whole tracts of country by the deluge of rain with which they are accompanied. These storms seldom occur far out in the open ocean, or beyond the tropics, or nearer the equator than nine or ten degrees. Their principal localities are the West India Islands, those of Madagascar, Mauritius, and Bourbon, the north-west coast of Africa, the Bay of Bengal, and the Chinese Sea, where they are variously called hurricanes, tornadoes, and typhoons. A heavy swell upon the sea, a dusky redness of the sky, a close oppressive air, and a wild irregularity in the appearance of things, are the usual precursors of a tropical tempest. Though generally confined to the districts mentioned, where they are of frequent occurrence, the extra-tropical latitudes, at more distant intervals, experience the force of the hurricane.

When were the winds
Let slip with such a warrant to destroy?
When did the waves so haughtily o’erleap
Their ancient barriers, deluging the dry?”

This is the language of Cowper in the Task, respecting the year 1783, when—amid the other events of that portentous season, noticed upon a previous page—a succession of storms, accompanied with violent rains, visited the whole of Great Britain, and caused considerable damage. But what is known in our records as the “Great Storm,” occurred on the night of the 26th and the morning of the 27th of November 1703, and has been referred to by almost all the writers of that period. Derham, in the Philosophical Transactions for the year following, states—

“Of the preceding parts of the year (1703), the months of April, May, June, and July were wet in the southern parts of England, particularly in May, when more rain fell than in any month of any year since 1690; June also was very wet; and though July had considerable intermissions, yet on the 28th and 29th there fell violent showers of rain, and the newspapers gave accounts of great rains that month from divers places of Europe. On Thursday, November 25th, the day before the tempest, in the morning there was a little rain, the winds high in the afternoon. In the evening there was lightning, and between nine and ten o’clock at night, a violent but short storm of wind, and much rain. Next morning, November 26th, the wind was S. S. W., and high all day, and so continued till I was in bed and asleep. About twelve that night the storm awakened me, which gradually increased till near three that morning, and from thence till near seven it continued with the greatest violence; then it began to abate slowly and the mercury to rise swiftly.” This tempest filled the whole kingdom with terror, and produced immense commercial loss, and many melancholy accidents. The country between the Loire in France and the Trent in England was the chief scene of its ravages. The historians of those times give an affecting account of the dismal appearance of the district. Houses unroofed—steeples blown down—stacks of corn scattered abroad—vessels dismasted or wrecked—and upward of eight thousand persons drowned. “The wind,” says Oldmixon, “blew west-south-west, and grumbled like thunder, accompanied with flashes of lightning. It threw down several battlements and stacks of chimneys at St. James’ Palace; tore to pieces tall trees in the Park; and killed a servant in the house. The Guard-house at Whitehall was much damaged, as was the Banqueting-house. A great deal of lead was blown off Westminster Abbey; and most of the lead on churches and houses either rolled up in sheets or loosened. The pious and learned prelate Doctor Richard Kidder, Bishop of Bath and Wells, and his lady, were killed by the fall of part of the old episcopal palace at Wells. The Bishop of London’s sister, Lady Penelope Nicholas, was killed in like manner at Horsely in Sussex, and Sir John Nicholas—her husband—grievously hurt.” Upward of 800 houses, 400 windmills, and 250,000 timber-trees were thrown down; 100 churches unroofed; 300 sail lost upon the coast; 900 wherries and barges destroyed on the Thames; the Eddystone light-house, built by Winstanley, was overthrown; 15,000 sheep, besides other cattle, were drowned by the overflowing of the Severn; and Rear-Admiral Beaumont, with the crews of several ships, perished on the Goodwin Sands.

The West Indies and the vicinity of the Mauritius seem to be two principal foci of hurricanes, from their frequency and tremendous violence in those localities. Of thirteen hurricanes, described by Colonel Reid, in his interesting attempt to develop the law of storms, eleven took place in the neighborhood of the Mauritius and Madagascar, which sanctions an opinion prevalent among seamen, that gales are commonly avoided by ships steering in a course so as to keep well to the eastward of the Mauritius. To give some idea of a tropical hurricane, the particulars gathered by Colonel Reid from various sources, respecting that which desolated several of the West India Islands in the year 1831, are here introduced. It passed over Barbadoes, St. Lucia, St. Domingo, and Cuba, swept the northern shores of the Gulf of Mexico, raged simultaneously at Pensacola, Mobile, and New Orleans, entered the adjoining states, and seems to have been disorganized by the opposition offered to its progress by the mountain region of the Alleghanies. The hurricane accomplished the distance of 2000 miles in 150 hours, at an average velocity of 13½ miles an hour, but the rate of its progressive motion was insignificant in comparison with that of its rotatory movement, a feature hereafter to be adverted to. Before its arrival at St. Vincent, a cloud was observed to the north by a resident, so threatening in its aspect and peculiar in its color, that of _olive green_, that, impressed with a sense of impending danger, he hastened home, and by nailing up his doors and windows saved his house from the general calamity. In this island, the most remarkable effect of the storm was the destruction of an extensive forest at its northern extremity, the trees of which were _killed without being blown down_. In 1832, these trees were frequently examined by Colonel Reid, and appeared not to have been killed by the wind, but by the immense quantity of electric matter rendered active during the storm. When at its height, two negroes at Barbadoes were greatly terrified by sparks of electricity passing off from one of them, as they were struggling in the darkness, in the garden of Coddrington College, to reach the main building, after the destruction of their hut. Such was the quantity of spray carried inland from the sea by the wind, that it rained salt water over the whole island, which killed the fresh-water fish in the ponds, and several ponds continued salt for some days after the storm. The afternoon that ushered in the hurricane, that of the 11th of August, was one of dismal gloom, but about four o’clock, there was an _obscure circle of imperfect light toward the zenith_ subtending an angle of 35° or 40°. Variable squalls of wind and rain, with intervening calms, prevailed till midnight, when the lightning flashed fearfully, and a gale blew fiercely from the north and north-east. At 1 A. M. the wind increased, but suddenly shifted its quarter, blowing from north-west and intermediate points. Toward three o’clock, after a little intermission, the hurricane again burst from the western points, hurling before it thousands of missiles—the fragments of every unsheltered work of human art. The strongest houses vibrated to their foundations, and the surface of the earth trembled as the destroyer passed over it. There was no thunder at any time distinctly heard, but the horrible roar and yelling of the wind, the noise of the ocean, whose waves threatened the destruction of every thing in Barbadoes that the other elements might spare, the clattering of tiles, the falling of roofs and walls, and the combination of a thousand other sounds, formed a hideous and appalling din. As soon as the dawn rendered outward objects visible, and, the storm abating, permitted the inhabitants of Bridgetown to venture out, a grand but distressing picture of ruin presented itself. From the summit of the cathedral tower, the whole face of the country appeared the wreck of its former condition. No sign of vegetation could be observed, except here and there a few patches of sickly green. The surface of the ground exhibited the scorching and blackening effect of the lightning. A few remaining trees, stripped of their boughs and foliage, wore a cold and wintry aspect; and the numerous villas in the neighborhood, formerly concealed amid thick groves, were exposed and in ruins.

In the year 1837, three hurricanes occurred in the West Indies and adjacent parts of the Atlantic, the narratives of which, as collected by Colonel Reid from different observers, present some singular features. The first passed over Barbadoes on the 26th of July. The sky assumed a blue-black appearance, with a red glare at the verge of the horizon. The flashes of lightning were accompanied with a whizzing noise, like that of a red-hot iron plunged in water. The barometer and sympiesometer fell rapidly and sunk to 28·45 inches. The Antigua hurricane, the second of that year, commenced in the Atlantic, on the night of the 31st of July, and was encountered by Captain Seymour, in the brigantine Judith and Esther of Cork. He observed near the zenith _a white appearance of a round form_, and while looking stedfastly at it, a sudden gust of wind carried away the topmast and lower scudding sails. During the hurricane the eyes of the crew were remarkably affected, their sight became dim, and every one of their _finger-nails turned quite black_, and remained so nearly five weeks afterward. The captain inferred, from the universality of the effect, that it could not have been produced by the firmness of the grasp with which they were holding by the rigging, but that the whole was caused by an electric body in the elements. On the 2d of August, in another situation, the Water Witch was caught by the skirts of the same storm, the wind blowing in squalls from the W. and N. N. W. till the evening, when “a calm succeeded,” states Captain Newby, “for about ten minutes; and then, in the most tremendous, unearthly screech I ever heard, it recommenced from the south and south-west.” The third hurricane of the year was met with by the Rawlins, about midnight of the 18th of August, when, after blowing violently for twelve hours from the north, in an instant a perfect calm ensued for an hour, and then, quick as thought, the wind sprung up with tremendous force from the south-west, no swell whatever preceding the convulsion. During this hurricane, an extraordinary phenomenon presented itself, resembling a _solid, black, perpendicular wall_ about 15° or 20° above the horizon, which disappeared and became visible again several times, described by one of the observers, as “the most appalling sight he had ever seen during his life at sea.” A similar spectacle is described by an officer on board the ship Tartarus, during a hurricane on the American coast in the year 1814:—“No horizon appeared, but only a something resembling an _immense wall_ within ten yards of the ship.” The power of the wind was remarkably exemplified during the great hurricane of 1780, which at Barbadoes forced its way into every part of the Government-house, and tore off most of the roof, though the walls were three feet thick, and the doors and windows had been well barricaded. Obliged to retreat from thence, the governor and his family fled to the ruins of the foundation of the flag-staff, and, compelled to relinquish that station, they with difficulty reached the cannon of the fortifications, under the carriages of which they took shelter. But here they were not secure, for the cannons were moved by the fury of the wind, and they dreaded every moment that the guns would be dismounted, and crush them by their fall. From the preceding accounts it appears that the agency of electricity is frequently extensively developed in hurricanes; that they have a progressive motion; that calms of short duration occur during their continuance; after which the wind bursts forth from a quarter different to that from which it has been blowing—peculiarities which have led to a theory respecting storms which may be considered as established in its leading principles.

Down to a very recent date, a hurricane was generally deemed to be simply a gale of wind pursuing with immense velocity a rectilinear direction. Colonel Capper departed from this idea after investigating the storms of the Indian Ocean, and published the conclusion in the year 1801, that the hurricanes he had examined in that region were real whirlwinds of varying diameter, having a progressive as well as a rotatory motion. The evidence collected from the records of an immense number of storms in the Atlantic by Mr. Redfield, of New York, and in the Indian Ocean by Colonel Reid, seems to place beyond all dispute the fact, that they occur in the form of a ring, having an outer circle, where the air revolves with intense velocity, and an interior space, the diameter of which is sometimes equal to several hundred miles, the vortex of the whirlwind, which is the scene of gusts and lulls, a comparatively slow progressive motion on the surface of land and sea distinguishing the whole. A hurricane which occurred at New Brunswick in the year 1835 strikingly exhibited the character of a revolving storm; for, while about the centre bodies of great weight were carried spirally upward, at the extremities the trees were thrown in opposite directions. The same circumstance was observed at Barbadoes in 1831, near the northern coast: the trees which the hurricane uprooted lay from N. N. W. to S. S. E., having been thrown down by a northerly wind, while in some other parts of the island they lay from S. to N., having been prostrated by a southerly wind. It is evident, therefore, that the direction of the wind at a particular point affords no indication of the course in which the whole revolving mass of the atmosphere is advancing. Another singular conclusion respecting storms, which the American and Anglican philosophers, along with Professor Dove of Berlin, have arrived at by independent investigations, is, that the hurricanes in the southern hemisphere revolve in a _counter direction_ to those in the northern; and while the axis of a storm in the North Atlantic has a progressive motion from the equator obliquely toward the north pole, that of one in the Indian Ocean proceeds obliquely from the equator toward the south pole. In the Pacific Ocean, a region of hurricanes, their revolving motion appears to be sanctioned by the evidence which has been obtained respecting them. Mr. Williams, the missionary, describes a hurricane at Raratonga, one of the Hervey Islands, during which the rain descended in deluging torrents, the lightning darted in fiery streams among the dense, black clouds, the thunder rolled deep and loud through the heavens, and the island trembled to its very centre as the war of the elements raged over it. Scarcely a banana or plaintain tree was left, either on the plains, or in the valleys, or upon the mountains; hundreds of thousands of which, on the preceding day, covered and adorned the land with their foliage and fruit, and immense chestnuts, which had withstood the storms of ages, were laid prostrate on the ground, while those that remained erect had scarcely a branch, and were all leafless. It was observed, that when the gale ended, the wind was in the west, whereas in the early part of its action the east end of the chapel had been blown in, which shows the wind then to have been in the east. The hurricanes of New South Wales have been observed to develop the same peculiarity. Mr. Meredith traced the path of one in the centre, and found at the termination a circle plainly shown, in which the trees lay all ways.

The cause of this rotatory motion of storms remains in obscurity, but it is probably due in part to the same law under which eddies or whirlpools are formed in water, by two currents being obliquely impelled against each other. The great hurricanes may thus be considered identical with the small local whirlwinds, which are common with us in the summer season, carrying upward and along the dust and loose grass in spiral columns, exhibiting a progressive and rotatory motion. In the region of the sandy deserts these atmospheric whirls transpire upon a great scale, raising up immense quantities of the loose particles in columns to a considerable height, which sweep along with prodigious violence, and have occasionally swallowed up whole caravans in their tremendous vortex.

“Man mounts on man, on camels camels rush,
Hosts march on hosts, and nations nations crush,
Wheeling in air the winged islands fall,
And one great earthy ocean covers all.”

“One of the largest of these pillars of sand,” says a modern traveler, Caille, “crossed our camp, overset all the seats, and whirling us about like straws, threw one of us on the other in the utmost confusion. We knew not where we were, and could not distinguish any thing at the distance of a foot. The sand wrapped us in darkness like a fog, and the sky and the earth seemed confounded and blended in one. Whilst this frightful tempest lasted we remained stretched on the ground motionless, dying of thirst, burned by the heat of the sand, and buffeted by the wind. We suffered nothing, however, from the sun, whose disk, almost concealed by the clouds of sand, appeared dim and deprived of its rays.” Bruce has sketched with spirit several of these desert whirlwinds, of which he was an eye-witness:—“At one o’clock,” he states, “we alighted among some acacia trees at Waadi el Halboub, having gone twenty-one miles. We were here at once surprised and terrified by a sight surely one of the most magnificent in the world. In that vast expanse of desert, from W. to N. W. of us, we saw a number of prodigious pillars of sand at different distances, at times moving with great celerity, at others stalking on with a majestic slowness; at intervals we thought they were coming in a few minutes to overwhelm us; and small quantities of sand did actually more than once reach us. Again they would retreat so as to be almost out of sight, their tops reaching to the very clouds. There the tops often separated from the bodies, and these, once disjoined, dispersed in the air, and did not appear more. Sometimes they were broken in the middle, as if struck with large cannon-shot. About noon they began to advance with considerable swiftness upon us, the wind being very strong at the north. Eleven of them ranged alongside of us about the distance of three miles. The greatest diameter of the largest appeared to me at that distance as if it would measure ten feet. They retired from us with a wind at S. E., leaving an impression upon my mind to which I can give no name, though surely one ingredient in it was fear, with a considerable deal of wonder and astonishment. It was in vain to think of flying; the swiftest horse, or fastest sailing ship, could be of no use to carry us out of this danger; and the full persuasion of this riveted me as if to the spot where I stood. The same appearance of moving pillars of sand presented themselves to us this day, in form and disposition like those we had seen at Waadi Halboub, only they seemed to be more in number and less in size. They came several times in a direction close upon us; that is, I believe, within less than two miles. They began immediately after sunrise like a thick wood, and almost darkened the sun. His rays shining through them for near an hour, gave them an appearance of pillars of fire. Our people now became desperate; the Greeks shrieked out and said it was the day of judgment; Ismael pronounced it to be hell; and the Turcorories, that the world was on fire.” The procession of tall columns of dust, the upper end seeming to vanish off, or puff away like light smoke, and the lower apparently touching the earth, is not unusual on the large plains of New South Wales, in dry weather. They move in a perpendicular position, quietly and majestically gliding along one after another, but really so fast that the fleetest horse is unable to keep pace with them. According to Mrs. Meredith, when they are crossing a brook, the lower portion of the dust is lost sight of, and a considerable agitation disturbs the water, but immediately on landing the same appearance is resumed. “As some vanish,” she remarks, “others imperceptibly arise and join the giant waltz; and when I first observed this most singular display, I amused myself by fancying them a new species of genii relaxing from their more laborious avocations, and having a sedate and stately dance all to themselves. When the dance ends, these dusty performers always appear to sit down among the neighboring hills.” To the same class with these rotating and progressing pillars of sand, that singular phenomenon called the _waterspout_ clearly belongs, a whirlwind raising into a columnar mass the waters of the sea, and causing the aqueous vapors in the atmosphere to assume the same form, the two frequently uniting, the whole presenting a magnificent spectacle.

The Greeks applied the term Prester to the waterspout, which signifies a fiery fluid, from its appearance being generally accompanied with flashes of lightning, and a sulphureous smell, showing the activity of the electrical principle in the air. Lucretius refers to it in the following terms:—

Hence, with much ease, the meteor may we trace
Termed, from its essence, Prester by the Greeks,
That oft from heaven wide hovers o’er the deep.
Like a vast column, gradual from the skies,
Prone o’er the waves, descends it; the vexed tide
Boiling amain beneath its mighty whirl,
And with destruction sure the stoutest ship
Threat’ning that dares the boist’rous scene approach.

Waterspouts exhibit various aspects, but a frequent appearance has been thus described, as it has been observed at sea. Under a dense cloud, a circular area of the ocean, in diameter from 100 to 120 yards, shows great disturbance, the water rushing toward the centre of the agitated mass, from whence it rises in a spiral manner toward the clouds, assuming a trumpet-shape, with the broad end downward. At the same time, the cloud assumes a similar form, but the position of the cone is inverted, and its lower extremity, or apex, gradually unites with the upper extremity of the ascending column of water. At the point of junction, the diameter is not more than two or three feet. There is thus a column of water and vapor formed, extending from the sea to the cloud, thin in the middle, and broad at the two extremities, the sides of which are dark, which gives it the appearance of a hollow tube. It moves with the wind, and even in calm weather, when no wind is perceptible, the position shifts. Sometimes the spout preserves the perpendicular in its motion, but frequently, from the wind not acting with equal force upon its upper and lower extremities, or the one being more susceptible of impulsion than the other, it assumes an inclined position, and the column is speedily ruptured by the unequal velocity of its parts. A few minutes suffices in general for the duration of the phenomenon, but several have been known to continue for near an hour. Instances of repeated disruption and formation have been witnessed, and in the Mediterranean, as many as sixteen waterspouts have been observed at the same time. The mariners of former days were accustomed to discharge artillery at these moving columns, to accelerate their fall, fearful of their ships being crossed by them, and sunk or damaged—a practice alluded to by Falconer in the opening of the second canto of The Shipwreck: but the principal danger arises from the wind blowing in sudden gusts in their vicinity, from all points of the compass, sufficient to capsize small vessels carrying much sail. Waterspouts on land are not uncommon, and in this case there is no ascending column of water, but only a descending inverted cone of vapor. Vivid flashes of lightning frequently issue from them, and deluges of rain attend their disruption. A remarkable spout appeared and burst on Emott Moor, near Coln in Lancashire, in the year 1718, about a mile distant from some laborers digging peat, whose attention was directed to it by hearing an unusual noise in the air. Upon leaving the spot in alarm, they found a small rippling stream converted into a roaring flood, though no rain had fallen on the moor; and at the immediate scene of action, the earth had been swept away to the depth of seven feet, the naked rock appeared, and an excavation had been made in the ground by the force of the water discharged from the spout, upward of half a mile in length.

It is a time of fear and peril to man and beast when the hurricane develops its giant strength, yet, contemplated apart from the probability of some fatal catastrophe, there is no scene more intensely sublime in the varied panorama of nature, than that exhibited to the senses of sight and hearing, by the dense black masses of clouds that roll in wild confusion through the air, the tumultuous aspect of the ocean, the agitation of the woods, and the voice of the tempest, varying from the melancholy wail, to the piercingly shrill cry and deafening roar, and occasionally combining every kind of intonation in its sound. However destructive these extraordinary agitations of the atmosphere—however terrible such a situation as that of Æneas on the stormy sea, helpless and hopeless, stretching his folded hands to the stars, and lamenting that he had not fallen with fierce Hector on the Ilian plains—it is unquestionable, that neither “breeze, or gale, or storm,” could be dispensed with in the economy of nature; for the various forms of life which the common air sustains, are preserved in vigor by that conflict of the elements which works occasional disaster. A variety of natural causes in operation upon the surface of the globe, and in its interior, concur to derange that constitution of the atmosphere which is alone salubrious, to vitiate the fluid, convert the medium of life and health into a cause of fever, pestilence, and death, thus changing every scene where the machinery of human existence is in movement into a Grotto del Cane, completely arresting all its wheels—an effect which would undoubtedly transpire without an antagonistic influence in constant action. In the process of supporting mankind and animals, the atmosphere is deprived of its oxygen, and exhaled in a morbid condition unfit for combustion and the sustenance of life; and the respiration of plants contributes also to its derangement. The exhalations from the low swampy regions of the earth are a further cause of deterioration, and hence the malarious mass to which the Pontine marshes, and similar districts, give birth. The provision against the reduction of the atmosphere to a universally disorganised and vitiated condition is the currents that prevail in it, which disperse and separate the poisonous ingredients, render them innocuous by bringing them into new combinations, and thus keep up that due proportion between the component parts of the aerial envelop, upon which its life-conserving property hinges, yet which the functions of life are perpetually destroying. The ordinary play of the winds, whispering in gentle breezes and rushing in powerful gales, has been ordained by the Author of life to subserve this purpose, and the dread tornado is also an efficient agent in the regeneration. In its alembic, it has been remarked, “the isolated poisons will be re-distilled; by the electric fires which it generates, their deleterious sublimations will be deflagrated; and thus will the great Alchymist neutralize the azotic elements which he has let loose, and shake the medicinal draught into salubrity.” The baneful effects of a stagnant condition of the atmosphere are exemplified in the feeble physical frame, and short term of years, of those who in the “city full” are cooped up in sites were there is no sufficient ventilation, and the inhabitants of many deep inclosed valleys exhibit physical and mental deterioration as a consequence of the same cause. The numerous examples of cretinism, or idiocy, with goitres, found about the villages and hamlets of the Lower Valais, and the Val d’Aosta in Switzerland—valleys, which have low marshy spots at the bottom, surrounded by high mountains, where the fresh air does not circulate freely, and where the reflected rays of the sun are very powerful in summer—Saussure attributed to the stagnation of the atmosphere; and though such instances of physical deformity and intellectual incapacity may be the combined effect of various causes, it is in harmony with the known effect of the one referred to, to suppose it materially to contribute to the result. The cagots of the deep Pyrenean valleys answer to the cretins of the Alps.

In closing this notice of atmospheric currents, we refer to observations made upon the ordinary winds of Great Britain. From an average of ten years of the register kept by order of the Royal Society, it appears that at London the wind blows annually in the following proportions:—

Days.
South-west 112
North-east 58
North-west 50
West 53
South-east 32
East 26
South 18
North 16

The same register shows, that the south-west wind blows at an average more frequently than any other wind during every month of the year, and that it blows longest in July and August; that the north-east blows most constantly during January, March, April, May, and June, and most seldom during February, July, September, and December; and that the north-west wind blows oftener from November to March, and more seldom during September and October, than any other months.

* * * * *

=INFLUENCE OF PLACE ON RACE.=

=BY BON GAULTIER.=

Blancs ou noirs, gelés ou rotis,
Mortels que j’ai faits si petits,
Dit le bon Dieu, d’un air paterne,
On pretende que je vous gouverne;
Mais vous devez voir, Dieu merci,
Que j’ai des ministres aussi. Beranger.

Are not the mountains, waves and skies a part
Of us and of our souls, as we of them? Byron.

Though there seems no good reason to doubt that the earth was made for man, and that he has got the supremacy of it, yet we believe it is as little to be doubted that his character and royalty have been very much modified by “the beggarly elements” of the world, and still continue to be so, though in a lesser degree than during the earlier ages of his existence in it. In more recent times a great many causes, arising from customs, laws, beliefs, and so forth, have been effective aids in establishing the diversities of nations, such as we see them. But the great disposing causes, operating on men earliest and producing the most permanent tendencies, were in the localities in which they found themselves, and multiplied their generations; and these influences of place can still, in the divisions of the human family, be distinctly traced beneath all others which civilization may have superinduced.

We are not disposed alone to test this proposition by the differences existing between the European families and their affiliations. We would go further, and comprehend “the black men, the white men, the frozen and fried,” of whom Beranger speaks—the eight or nine hundred millions that, at this moment, are crawling about on the thick rotundity of the globe; and thence argue that the soil and the sun have been the chief modifiers of all the human varieties. But here we are met, _in liminé_—on the threshold of our disquisition—by a crowd of respectable names, among which are those of Professor Agassiz, Van Amringe, Dr. Morton, etc., backed by arguments denying our right to conclude, from the apparent difference of race, the operation of topical influences. These philosophers say there were other causes—that, in fact, these differences were mainly produced by creation—that several distinct species of men were fashioned by the Divine hand, to suit the elemental diversities of the world.

Of course we cannot get along without considering these views—very fairly urged and very worthy of consideration. Every effort after truth is a good thing in itself—even though, like the arrow of Acestes, it should miss its aim, and only make something to wonder at:—

Volens liquidis in nubibus arsit arundo
Signavitque viam flammis tenuesque recessit
Consumpta in ventis.

Though the philosophy of Agassiz and the rest has not, however, been dissipated in thin air, we have an idea, nevertheless, that it has failed, like the Trojan’s arrow. We “cannot away with” that notion of making a species of man for every extreme climate of the globe, and do not think they have at all made the matter clear. They argue analogically. Their opponents argue analogically too. Pritchard and others support their views of the unity of the human species by the analogy of animals. They bring forward a very strong argument in the fact, that hybrids of plants or animals—the offspring of different species—are sterile, as a general law of nature. The offspring of the most dissimilar races of men are never hybrid—but capable of continuing the kind. Pritchard says the difference between the skull of the domestic hog and that of the wild boar is as great as that between the European and Negro skulls; and Blumenbach says there is more difference between the skulls of the Neapolitan and Hungarian breed of horses, respectively, than between the most dissimilar human heads.

But those who agree with Agassiz rely a good deal upon the assertions of Dr. Morton, of Philadelphia, and adduce several instances in which hybrids were found to be fruitful—mostly, however, in conjunction with an animal of pure stock. Still, these cases are so exceptional, or so uncertain, that no general conclusion can be drawn from them, sufficient to make head against Pritchard, Buffon, Cuvier, Hunter, and those who argue with them, on the matter. The general law is the true one. A man has suckled an infant, and a heifer, that never calved, has given milk; but such things cannot tell against the order of Nature.