Page images
PDF
EPUB

tional instruction can surely be obtained: for those who engage in this work should have some especial training in Biblical knowledge in order that they may command attention and success. If these classes

were periodically met by the preachers, either separately or together, and addressed on subjects connected with their spiritual and temporal well-being, the general effect must be to restrain and withdraw them from evil, and allure them to Christ; while many of these stray sheep would be

"Gather'd into his fold,
With his people enroll'd,

With his people to live and to die.”

Methodism has done wonders both at home and abroad. This, under God, has been mainly owing to its organization. Should the same system, and combination, and vigor be brought fully to bear upon the religious education of our youth, we shall see greater things yet. Our infant schools will then be multiplied a thousandfold, and young children placed under the rays of the light of life from their tenderest years. Our Sunday schools will be greatly augmented in number, improved in character, and rendered more eminently than ever the nurseries of enlightened religion. Our week-day schools will impart the same celestial instruction day by day, with the addition of some very valuable secular knowledge. Our Bible classes will further instruct and preserve those young persons who have ceased to attend our schools; among whom will be our apprentices and maid-servants, as well as the youthful members of more wealthy families. Solomon says, "In all labor there is profit ;" and the more this field is cultivated, the less it will contain of wayside, of rock, and of thorns; and the more of that "good ground" which will prove abundantly fruitful. What are called “revivals,” to which, thank God, our churches are no strangers, will become showers of rain, falling upon ground tilled and full of seed; and we can scarcely fail to "reap in due time."

The influence of all this upon our societies and congregations generally can scarcely fail to be salutary; since its tendency must be more and more to render Methodism "fair as the sun, clear as the moon, and terrible as an army with banners;" for such a large body of mingled light and love will be sure both to give pleasure to all the wise and the good, and to make a deep and wide impression upon that vast mass of ignorance and sin with which we are still surrounded.

SAMUEL JACKSON.

REVIEW.

From the Edinburgh Review, or Critical Journal, for January, 1839.

1. An Attempt to Develop the Law of Storms by means of Facts, arranged accord. ing to Place and Time; and hence, to point out a cause for the variable Winds, with the view to practical use in Navigation. By Lieut. Colonel REID, C. B., of the Royal Engineers. 8vo. London: 1838. With an Atlas of nine Charts. 2. Remarks on the prevailing Storms of the Atlantic Coast of the North American States. By WILLIAM C. REDFIELD, of the City of New-York. (Silliman's Journal, Vol. XX.)

3. Hurricane of August, 1831. By W. C. REDFIELD. (Silliman's Journal, Vol. XXI.)

4. Observations on the Hurricanes and Storms of the West Indies, and the Coast of the United States. By W. C. REDFIELD. (Blunt's American Coast Pilot. 12th Edition, pp. 626-629.)

5. On the Gales and Hurricanes of the Western Atlantic. By W. C. REDFIELD. (United States Naval Magazine.)

Ir is mortifying to the pride of science, and a reproach to every civilized government, that we know so little of meteorology—of the laws and perturbations of that aerial fluid which exists within and around us--which constitutes the pabulum of life; and in which we should instantly perish, were it either polluted or scantily supplied. Considering the earth's atmosphere merely in its chimical and statistical relations, our knowledge of its properties is at once extensive and profound. We have decomposed the gaseous mass into its elements, and ascertained their separate agencies in sustaining and destroying life. Its weight, its variable density, its altitude, its action upon light, its electrical and magnetical phenomena, its varying temperature, whether we ascend from the earth, or move to different points on its surface, have all been investigated with an accuracy of result honorable to the industry and genius of philosophers. But, however great be the knowledge which we have acquired of our aerial domains, when in a state of serenity and peace, we must confess our utter ignorance of them in a state of tumult and excitement. When the paroxysms of heat and cold smite the organizations of animal and vegetable life-when the swollen cloud pours down its liquid charge, and menaces us with a second deluge-when the rag. ing tempest sweeps over the earth with desolating fury, driving beneath the surge, or whirling into the air, the floating or the fixed dwellings of man-when the electric fires, liberated from their gaseous prison, shiver the fabrics of human power, and rend even the solid pavement of the globe-when the powers of the air are thus marshalled against him, man trembles upon his own hearth, the slave of terrors which he cannot foresee, the sport of elements which he cannot restrain, and the victim of desolation from which he knows not how to escape.

But though the profoundest wisdom has been hitherto of no avail in emergencies like these, it would be at variance with the whole history of scientific research to suppose that effectual means may never be obtained for protecting life and property when thus endangered, or at least for diminishing the hazards to which they are exposed. The philosopher in his closet has already done some

thing to protect as well as to forewarn. The electric conductor, when skillfully applied, has performed some function of mercy in guarding our houses and our ships; and the indications of the barometer and sympiesometer have doubtless warned the mariner to reef his topsails, and prepare for the struggle of the elements. But, paltry as these auxiliaries are, they are almost the only ones which unaided science can supply. It belonged to the governments of Europe and America, and pre-eminently to ours, whose royal and commercial marine almost covers the ocean, to encourage, by suitable appointments and high rewards every inquiry that could throw light upon the origin and nature of those dire catastrophes by which, in one day, hundreds of vessels have been wrecked-thousands of lives sacrificed, and millions of property consigned to the deep. But, alas! they have done nothing. Ours, at least, has no national institution to which they could intrust such an inquiry; and the cause of universal humanity, involving the interests of every existing people, and of every future generation, is left, as all such causes are, to the feeble and isolated exertions of individual zeal.

It is fortunate, however, for our species, that the high interests of humanity and knowledge are not confided to the cares of ephemeral legislation. He who rides on the whirlwind has provided for the alleviation of the physical as well as the moral evils which are the instruments of his government; and in the last few years two or three individuals have devoted themselves to the study of the gales and hurricanes that desolate the tropical seas, with a zeal and success which the most sanguine could never have anticipated. They have not, indeed, yet succeeded in discovering the origin of these scourges of the ocean; but they have determined their general nature and character; and have thus been able to deduce infallible rules, if not to disarm their fury, at least to withdraw us from their power: and if so much has been done by the successive labors of two living individuals in the brief period of only six years, what may we not expect to achieve when meteorological inquiries shall be set on foot at suitable stations, and the science of Europe brought to bear on the observations which may be registered?

Before the attention of philosophers was directed to the investigation of individual tempests and hurricanes, it was generally believed that a gale differed from a breeze only in the velocity of the air which was put in motion; and a hurricane was supposed to be well explained when it was described as a wind moving in a rectilineal direction at the rate of 100 or 120 miles an hour.

The first person who seems to have opposed himself to this vulgar error was the late Colonel Capper, of the East India Company's service, who published, in 1801, a work" on the Winds and Monsoons." After studying all the circumstances of the hurricanes which occurred at Pondicherry and Madras in 1760 and 1773, this intelligent writer remarks, that these circumstances, when properly considered, positively prove that the hurricanes were whirlwinds whose diameter could not be more than 120 miles. Colonel Capper was also aware of the remarkable fact, that these whirlwinds had sometimes a progressive motion; and he not only states that ships might escape beyond their influence by taking advantage of the wind which blows from the land; but he refers to the practicability

of ascertaining the situation of a ship in a whirlwind, from the strength and changes of the wind, with the view, no doubt, of enabling the vessel to resist its fury, and escape from its vortex.

These observations, valuable though they be, seem to have excited no interest either in this or in other countries; and the next philosopher who directed his attention to the subject was led to it by independent observations, and in the course of more extensive meteorological inquiries. Mr. W. C. Redfield, of New-York, whose position on the Atlantic coast gave him the finest opportunities not only of observing the phenomena, but of collecting the details of individual storms, was led to the same conclusion as Colonel Capper, that the hurricanes of the West Indies, like those of the East, were great whirlwinds. He found also, what had been merely hinted at by Colonel Capper, that the whole of the revolving mass of atmosphere advanced with a progressive motion from south-west to north-east; and hence he draws the conclusion, that the direction of the wind at a particular place forms no part of the essential character of the storm, and is in all cases compounded of both the rotative and progressive velocities of the storm in the mean ratio of these velocities. Mr. Redfield was conducted to these generalizations by the study of the hurricane of September, 1821; but, in order to corroborate his views, he has taken the more recent hurricane of the 17th August, 1830, and, by the aid of a chart, he has exhibited its character, and traced its path along the Atlantic coast, as deduced from a diligent collation of accounts from more than seventy different localities.

Interesting as these details are, our limits will only permit us to give a few of the leading facts, along with the results at which Mr. Redfield has arrived. The hurricane of 1830 seems to have commenced at St. Thomas on the 12th of August at midnight; and, continuing its course along the Bahama Islands and the coast of Florida, it passed along the American shores and terminated its devastations to the south of the island of St. Pierre, in long. 57 deg. west, and lat. 43 deg. north. It performed this long journey in about six days, at the average rate of about seventeen geographical miles per hour. The general width of the tract, which was more or less influenced by the hurricane, was from 500 to 600 miles; but the width of the tract where the hurricane was severe was only from 150 to 250 miles. The duration of the most violent portion of the storm at the several points over which it passed, was from seven to twelve hours, and the rate of its progress from the island of St. Thomas to its termination beyond the coast of Nova Scotia, varied from fifteen to twenty miles per hour.

The rotative character of this storm, which always moves from right to left, is amply proved by the varying directions of the wind at the different points of its path; but a striking evidence of this was exhibited in its action on two outward bound European ships, the Illinois and the Britannia. On the 15th August the Illinois experienced the swell which preceded the hurricane advancing from the south; but as the ship had a fair wind and was impelled by the Gulf Stream, while the storm lost time by making a detour toward Charleston and the coast of Georgia, the ship outran the swell; but on the 17th she was overtaken by the hurricane blowing furiously

from the south, while at the same moment it was blowing hard at New-York from the north-east. The Britannia, which left NewYork in fine weather on the 16th, met the hurricane on the same night, having the wind first at north-east, then ENE., and after midnight from the south-east.

After describing other hurricanes which led him to the same conclusions, Mr. Redfield remarks that their axis of revolution, or gyral axis, as he calls it, is probably inclined in the direction of its progress. This inclination he ascribes to the retardation of the lower part of the revolving mass by the resistance of the surface; in consequence of which the more elevated parts will be inclined forward, and overrun to a very considerable extent the more quiet atmosphere which lies near the surface. Hence we see the reason why vessels at sea sometimes encounter the sudden violence of these winds upon their lofty sails and spars, when all upon the deck is quiet

One of the most important deductions which Mr. Redfield has made from the facts and illustrations to which we have referred, is an explanation of the causes which produce a fall in the barometer at places to which a hurricane is approaching, or more immediately under its influence. This effect he ascribes to the centrifugal tendency of the immense revolving mass of atmosphere which constitutes a storm. This centrifugal action must expand and spread out the stratum of atmosphere subject to its influence; and toward the vortex or centre of rotation must flatten and depress the stratum so as to diminish the weight of the superincumbent column which presses on the mercury in the barometer.* Mr. Redfield also conceives that whatever be the upward limit of the revolving mass, the effect of its depression must be to lower the cold stratum of the upper atmosphere, particularly toward the more central portions of the storm; and by thus bringing it in contact with the humid stratum of the surface, to produce a permanent and continuous stratum of clouds, with an abundant precipitation of rain, or a deposition of "congelated" vapors, according to the state of temperature in the lower region.

He con

From these views Mr. Redfield is led to speculate on the cause of the hurricanes which prevail on the Atlantic coast. ceives that they "originate in detached and gyrating portions of the northern margin of the trade winds, occasioned by the oblique obstruction which is opposed by the islands to the direct progress of this part of the trades, or to the falling in of the northerly or eddy wind from the American coast upon the trades, or to both these causes combined."

Such is a brief analysis of the first and most important memoir of Mr. Redfield. The second paper contains a very short notice of the hurricane which, after raging with great violence at Barbadoes on the night of the 10th August, 1831, passed over St. Lucia, St. Domingo, and Cuba, and reached the northern shores of the Gulf of Mexico, in about 30 deg. of north lat., where it raged simul

* Hence we see the reason why the mercury in the barometer always rises again during the passage of the last portion of the gale, and reaches its greatest elevation after the storm has passed.

« PreviousContinue »