THE United States are washed by the Atlantic Ocean on nearly the whole of their eastern coast, and by the Pacific on a large portion of their western boundary.

Under the name of the Atlantic, is comprised that mass of water between the eastern coast of America and the western coast of Europe and Africa. In its narrowest part, between Europe and Greenland, it is one thousand miles wide, and opening thence to the south-west with the general range of the bounding continents, spreads under the northern tropic to a breadth of sixty degrees of longitude, or four thousand one hundred and seventy miles, without estimating the Gulf of Mexico. The general phenomena on the two opposing sides of the Atlantic have great resemblance. The Atlantic coast of the United States presents an elliptic curve in its entire extent, with three intermediate and similar curves; the first extending seven hundred miles from Cape Florida to Cape Hatteras, the second from Cape Hatteras five hundred miles to the outer capes of Massachusetts, and the third formed by the coasts of Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine. Opposite to the United States, the Atlantic admits soundings in every place near the shores, always deepening very gradually. We have not found an exact comparison of the natural history of the Atlantic with that of other oceans. The chief phenomenon that marks it along the coast of the states is the Gulf Stream.

Besides the regular periodical currents produced in the ocean by the tides, various others arise from different causes.31 The waters of the sea may be put in motion by an external impulse, by a difference in temperature and saltness, by the periodical meeting of the polar ice, or by the inequality of evaporation that takes place in different latitudes. Sometimes several of these causes concur in producing the same effect; at others, their actions are opposed to one another, and their effects wholly or partially destroyed. Some of those currents constantly follow the same direction, others are subject to periodical changes, whilst a third class are more accidental. The most regular and extensive current on the globe is that which constantly flows from east to west, between the tropics, and extends on each side of the equator to about the thirtieth degree of latitude.

This vast current necessarily results from the attraction of the heavenly bodies, the diurnal motion of the earth, and the direction of the trade winds. Its existence is incontestibly proved by the fact, that vessels sailing to the westward, are always ahead of their reckoning; that is, their real situation, as determined by observations of the heavenly bodies, is always found to be west of that estimated from the rate of which the vessel is supposed to sail, as impelled by the wind alone. This difference of situation is occasioned by the general movement of the waters in the same direction, and is, consequently, the proper measure of the current. This is the reason why navigators, in sailing from Europe to America and the West India Islands, make the latitude of the Canaries, and then shape their course in the direction of the wind and current across the Atlantic.

A general current also flows from the poles towards the equator. This arises from the increased evaporation in the equatorial regions, and the augmented temperature of the waters, which render them specifically lighter than those of the ocean in higher latitudes, as well as from the increased supplies produced by the melting of the polar ice; all of which render these currents necessary to maintain the equilibrium of this perpetually circulating fluid. Their existence and effects are fully attested by the enormous masses of polar ice, which they convey into the more temperate regions of the ocean, and which sometimes float as low as forty degrees of latitude.

These general currents are greatly modified, and changed into various directions by the obstacles they encounter in their progress. The coast of America, and the numerous islands with which it is flanked, intercept the general current of the Atlantic, and create what navigators call the Gulf Stream. This great current enters the Gulf of Mexico, and, sweeping round the shores of that gulf, issues with accelerated velocity towards the north, by the channel between the southern point of Florida and the Bahama Islands.32 It then rolls along the shore of North America, diminishing in velocity, but increasing in breadth, till it reaches the great bank of Newfoundland. There it suddenly turns towards the east and south-east, and flows with still decreasing velocity, towards the shores of Europe, the Azores, and the coasts of Africa. Navigators readily distinguish this current by the high temperature of its waters, their great saltness, their indigo color, and the shoals of sea-weed33 that cover their surface.

Humboldt, in May, 1804, observed its velocity in the twenty-seventh degree of latitude, and found it about eighty miles in twenty-four hours, though the north wind blew very strongly at the time of the observation. When it issues from the Gulf of Florida, its velocity resembles that of a torrent, and is sometimes five miles an hour, but at others not more than three. Between the nearest point of Florida, and the bank of Bahama, the breadth is only fifteen leagues, but a few degrees further north, it is seventeen; in the parallel of Charleston it is from forty to fifty leagues in breadth, and in latitude forty degrees and twenty-five minutes, this is increased to nearly eighty leagues. The waters of the torrid zone, being thus forcibly impelled towards the north-east, preserve their high temperature to such a degree, that, in latitude forty and forty-one degrees, it has been found to be seventy-two degrees of Fahrenheit, while out of the current the temperature of the water was only sixty-three degrees.

In the parallel of New York the temperature of the Gulf Stream is equal to that of the sea in latitude eighteen degrees. When the current reaches the western islands of the Azores, where the breadth is about one hundred and sixty leagues, the waters still preserve a part of the impulsion they receive in the Gulf of Florida, nearly one thousand leagues distant. Hence the current proceeds to the Canaries and the coast of Africa, and in the latitude of Cape Blanco, where the waters flow towards the south-west, they mingle with the current of the tropics, and recommence their tour from east to west.

From this it appears that the waters of the Atlantic, between the eleventh and forty-third degrees, are constantly drawn by currents into a kind of whirlpool; and if a drop of these waters be supposed to return precisely to the place from which it commenced its motion, Humboldt has calculated, from the known velocity of the current, that it would require two years and ten months to complete its circuit of three thousand eight hundred leagues.

‘A boat,’ he observes, ‘which may be supposed to receive no impulsion from the winds, would require thirteen months from the Canary Islands, to reach the coast of Caraccas, ten months to make the tour of the Gulf of Mexico and reach the Tortoise Shoals, opposite the port of Havana, while forty or fifty days might be sufficient to carry it from the straits of Florida to the bank of Newfoundland. Estimating the velocity of the water at seven or eight miles in twenty-four hours, in their progress from this bank to the coast of Africa, it would require ten or eleven months for this last distance. Such are the effects of this slow but regular motion, which agitates the waters of the ocean.’ The Gulf Stream furnished to Christopher Columbus indications of the existence of land to the west. This current had carried upon the Azores the bodies of two men of an unknown race, and pieces of bamboo of an enormous size. In latitude forty-five or fifty degrees, near Bonnet Flamand, an arm of the Gulf Stream flows from the south-west to the north-east, towards the coast of Europe. It deposits upon the coasts of Ireland and Norway, trees and fruits belonging to the torrid zone. Remains of a vessel burnt at Jamaica were found upon the coast of Scotland. It is likewise this river of the Atlantic which annually throws the fruits of the West Indies upon the shore of Norway.

The Pacific is also one of the great boundaries of the United States. By treaties with Spain and Russia our government possesses sovereignty along the Pacific ocean from latitude forty-two degrees to fifty-four degrees and forty minutes, which is equal to about eight hundred and eighty statute miles. This great ocean extends from Beering’s Straits to the antarctic circle, a distance of three thousand two hundred leagues, and from Asia and New Holland to America. It is separated from the Atlantic and Antarctic oceans only by imaginary lines. Its extreme breadth, a little north of the equator, is four thousand five hundred and fifty leagues; between South America and New Holland, latitude thirty degrees south, it is two thousand nine hundred and seventy leagues. It contains an immense number of islands spread over its surface, particularly between latitude thirty degrees north and fifty degrees south, to which modern geographers have given the general appellation of Oceanica. It was first called the South Sea by the European navigators who entered it from the north. Magellan gave it the name of Pacific, on account of the prevalence of calms which he experienced in it; but it by no means deserves the name, as it is remarkable for the fury of its storms, and the agitation of its waters. The trade-winds, which constantly blow between the tropics, render the passage from the western coast of America to Asia very short; but the return is proportionately difficult. The Portuguese were the first Europeans who entered the Pacific, which they did from the east. Balboa, in 1513, discovered it from the summit of the mountains which traverse the Isthmus of Darien. Magellan sailed across it from east to west in 1521.34

The Pacific, by its general motion, retreats from the coast of America, and flows from east to west; and this motion is very powerful in the vast and uninterrupted extent of that sea. Near Cape Corriantes, in Peru, the sea appears to flow from the land by this single cause. Ships are carried with rapidity from the port of Acapulco, in Mexico, to the Philippine Islands. But in order to return, they are obliged to go to the north of the tropics, to seek the polar current, and the variable winds. On the other side, the south polar current, finding no land to impede it, carries along with it the polar ice even to the latitude where the motion of the tropical current begins to be felt. This is the reason why, in the southern hemisphere, floating pieces of ice are met with at fifty and even at forty degrees.

In its motion towards the west, the Pacific is impeded by an immense archipelago of flats, islands, submarine mountains, and even land of considerable extent; it penetrates into this labyrinth, and there forms one current after another. The direction which the principal of these currents observe, is conformable to the general motion towards the west. But, as might be expected, the inequalities of the basin of the sea, the coasts, and the chains of submarine mountains, sometimes turn these currents toward the north or south. We may easily conceive that a strong repercussion of the waters of the ocean, in consequence of their meeting with a large mass of land, (as New South Wales,) may even produce a counter current, which will return towards the east, and which, by breaking, will also produce other currents, adverse and dangerous to navigators, and such as were encountered by Cook and La Perouse.

The Pacific Ocean is bounded on the east by Asia. Beering’s Straits connects it with the Arctic Ocean, and the line which indicates the one hundred and forty-seventh eastern meridian, arbitrarily separates it from the Indian Ocean. Geographers divide the Pacific into the northern and southern, the equator being the line of demarcation. This ocean occupies fifty millions of square miles; nearly one fourth part of the surface of the globe. It covers three times the extent of the Indian, and twice the extent of the Atlantic Ocean.