their ages can be ascertained, the judgment of the tion, at Newcastle, by a very intelligent officer and court, upon its own view of the subject, shall be ade- excellent observer, Lieut.-Col. Reid of the Royal Enquate and final. The negroes thus bound, are (by their masters or mistresses) to be taught to read and write, gineers, in a "Report explaining the progress`made and to be brought up to some useful occupation, agree- towards developing the Law of Storms, and a statement ably to the laws of the Commonwealth of Virginia, pro- of what seems desirable should be further done to adrance viding for the support of orphan and other poor chil- our knowledge of the subject." Colonel Reid, at the dren. And I do hereby expressly forbid the sale or transportation out of the said Commonwealth, of any slave I meeting of the Physical Section of the British Associamay die possessed of, under any pretence whatsoever." tion, commenced by stating "that he had long been convinced that the operations of the Deity in the workings of his providential care over his creatures, were governed by fixed laws, designed by incomprehensible wisdom, arranged by supreme power, and tending to the most benevolent ends. That however irregluar the tempest or the tornado might appear to the inobservant, yet our own day had seen some of these phe

On Storms. By Mr. William C. Redfield of New
York, and Lieutenant-Colonel Reid, Royal Engi-

neers.

Colonel Capper of the East India Company's ser-nomena reduced to rule; and he doubted not soon to vice, in a work on Winds and Monsoons, published in the year 1801, states it as his opinion, that hurricanes will be found to be great whirlwinds; and says, "It would not, perhaps, be a matter of great difficulty to ascertain the situation of a ship in a whirlwind, by observing the strength or changes of the wind. If the changes are sudden, and the wind violent, in all probability the ship must be near the centre of the vortex of the whirlwind; whereas, if the wind blows a great length of time from the same point, and the changes are gradual, it may reasonably be supposed that the ship is near the extremity of it."

This view of the nature of hurricanes appears to have been lost sight of for a long time, or to have been mentioned only in a very cursory manner, until an American observer, Mr. W. C. Redfield, published in the 20th volume of Silliman's well known American Journal of Science and Arts, a valuable memoir, entitled "Remarks on the prevailing Storms of the Atlantic coast of North America," in which he maintains (and we believe without any knowledge of Capper's work) that these storms are great whirlwinds. This memoir, inserted in the 18th vol. of the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, from its important details, and the general plausibility of the explanation offered, we esteemed a valuable contribution to the natural history of the winds. In the year 1834 we were again gratified by receiving from Mr. Redfield a copy of another memoir, entitled "Observations on the Hurricanes and Storms of the West Indies and the coast of the United States, with a chart," in which his opinion, as to the nature of storms, is farther enforced and supported by numerous additional observations. This memoir and the accompanying chart were also published in the 20th volume of The Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal. In this way we enabled British meteorologists to become acquainted with Mr. Redfield's observations and views. As our meteorologists generally had taken but little notice of these memoirs, we were rejoiced to find them brought prominently before the British Associa

convince the Section that we were on the eve of advancing some steps farther towards this most desirable end. He felt confident, indeed, that the laws of atmospheric changes were dependent on such fixed priuciples, that nothing was wanting but a more intimate acquaintance with the subject, to render man's knowledge of these laws as perfect as that which he had attained in any of the sciences now called strict. His attention had been first directed to the subject in 1831. He arrived, on military service, at Barbadoes, immediately after the desolating hurricane of that year, which, in the short space of seven hours, destroyed 1477 persons on that island alone. He had been for two years and a half daily employed as an engineer officer amidst the ruined buildings, and was thus naturally led to the consideration of the phenomena of hurricanes. The first explanation which to him seemed reasonable, he found in a pamphlet by W. C. Redfield of New York, extracted from the American Journal of Science, a work much less known in this country than its value and great merits deserved. The north-east storms on the coast of America had attracted the attention of Franklin. He had been prevented by one of these storms from observing an eclipse of the moon at Philadelphia, which he was soon after astonished to find had been felt at Boston, although that town lay to the north-east of Philadelphia. This was a circumstance not to be lost on such an inquiring mind as Franklin's: he ascertained, upon inquiry, that the same north-east storm had not reached Boston for some hours after it had blown at Philadelphia; and that, although the wind blew from the north-east, yet the progress of the entire storm was from the south-west. He died, however, before he had made any further progress in this investigation. Col. Capper of the East India Company's service, after having studied meteorological subjects for twenty years in the Madras territory, published a work, in 1801, upon winds and monsoons, giving brief statements of their fatal effects, from Orme's 'History of Hindostan.' In this work he

were considered as of no further value. He had published at length the details of his examination of this question. He had procured the actual log-books of ships, and had combined their information with what he could obtain on land, thus comparing simultaneous observations over extended tracts. On the eighth chart he pointed out eight ships in several positions in the same storm, the tracks of several crossing the path of the storm, and the wind, as reported by the ships, corroborated by the reports from the land. The ob

states his belief that hurricanes will be found to be great whirlwinds; and says, 'it would not, perhaps, be a matter of great difficulty to ascertain the situation of a ship in a whirlwind, by observing the strength and changes of the wind. If the changes are sudden, and the wind violent, in all probability the ship must be near the centre of the vortex of the whirlwind; whereas, if the wind blows a great length of time from the same point, and the changes are gradual, it may reasonably be supposed that the ship is near the extremity of it.' In this conjecture respecting the nature of hurri-servations of ships possess this great advantage for mecanes, Col. Reid conceived Col. Capper to be decided- teorological research, that merchant-ships' log-books ly right, and the conclusion he drew from it has stood report the weather every two hours, and ships of war the test of close examination. Mr. Redfield, following have hourly observations always kept up. After tracing up the observation of Franklin, and though probably a variety of storms in north latitudes, and being imunacquainted with the views or opinions of Capper, pressed with the regularity with which they appear to ascertained that, while the north-east storms were pass toward the North Pole, and always revolved in blowing on the shores of America, the wind was with the same direction,-viz. opposite to the hands of a equal violence blowing a south-west storm on the At-watch, or from the east round by the north, west, south, lantic. Tracking Franklin's storms from the south- and east, he was led to conclude, that, in accordance ward, he found, throughout their course, that the wind with the order of nature, storms in south latitudes on opposite sides of the shore, over which the storm would be found to revolve in a contrary direction to prevailed, blew in opposite directions, and that, in that which they take in the northern hemispheres. He fact, the entire storm was a progressive whirlwind, earnestly sought for facts, to ascertain if this were and that all these whirlwinds revolved constantly really the case, and had obtained much information in the same direction. In one of the numbers of confirmatory of the truth of the conjecture, before he the American Journal of Science (for 1831), Colonel was aware that Mr. Redfield had formed the same conReid found collected together by Mr. Redfield many jecture, without, however, having traced any storms records of the same storms, and a chart, on a very in south latitudes. The general phenomena of these small scale, shewing the progress of one. Strongly storms will be understood, if the storm, as a great impressed with the conviction that Mr. Redfield's whirlwind, be represented by a circle, whose centre is views were correct, he determined to verify them by made to progress along a curve, or part of a curve, making charts on a large scale, and laying down on which is, in most cases, of a form approaching the them the different reports of the directions of the wind parabolic, the circles expanding as they advance from at points given in the American Journal of Science; the point at which the storm begins to be felt, the roand the more exactly this was done, the nearer was tatory motion in the northern hemisphere being in the the approximation to the tracks of a progressive whirl- contrary direction to that in which the hands of a wind. He then exhibited to the Section a volume con- watch go round; while, in the southern hemisphere, taining eight charts on a large scale, of which the first the rotation is in the same direction as that in which and second chart contained the result of this part of the the hands of a watch revolve. He pointed out how his examination; and he explained how the arrows shew-views were illustrated by the disastrous storm of 1809, ing the direction of the wind at the several stations experienced by the East India fleet, under the convoy were all on the right hand side of the several circles flying from the south, while at the stations at the left hand, or towards the east of the chart, they were all coming from the north. Colonel Reid went on to explain, that as his object was not to establish or support any theory, but simply to arrange and record facts, he had only at present to give such a sketch of what had been done, as would turn the attention of abler men than himself to this investigation, and to impress upon commercial men the importance of carefully preserving the logs of their merchant ships: the practice was, he found, to return these logs to the brokers so soon as the vessel returned to her port, and after his accounts were balanced, they

of the Culloden line-of-battle ship, and the Terpsichore frigate, and four British men-of-war, which left the Cape of Good Hope about the same time, intending to cruise about the Mauritius. Some of these vessels scudded and ran in the storm for days; some, by lying to, got almost immediately out of it, while others, by taking a wrong direction, went into the heart of it, foundered, and were never heard of more: others, by sailing right across the calm space, met the same storm in different parts of its progress, and the wind blowing in opposite directions, and considered and spoke of it as two storms, which they encountered; while others, by cruising about within the bend of the curve, but beyond the circle of the great whirl, escaped

the storm altogether, which had been for days raging on all sides of them. This led him to draw the very important practical conclusion as to how a ship should act when she encountered a gale, so as to escape from it. By watching the mode of veering of the wind, the portion of a storm into which a ship is falling may be ascertained: if the ship be then so manœuvred as that the wind shall veer aft instead of ahead, and the vessel is made to come up, instead of being allowed to break off, she will run out of the storm altogether; but, if the contrary course be taken, either through chance or ignorance, she goes right into the whirl, and runs a great risk of being suddenly taken aback, but most assuredly will meet the opposite wind in passing out through the whirl. To accomplish her object, he showed, by a diagram, that it was necessary that the ship should be laid on opposite tacks, on opposite sides of a storm, as may be understood by drawing a number of concentric circles to represent the whirl of the hurricane, and then different lines across these, to represent the course of ships entering into, or going through the storm: but, to attempt the full explanation of even this, would extend much beyond our limits.

caused around the poles of magnets; thus he saw the magnet, when in conjunction with the voltaic battery, making contrary revolutions around the two poles. He also stated, that where Major Sabine had found the magnetic intensity least, viz., at St. Helena, there were no violent storms, his line of least intensity appearing to be the true Pacific Ocean of the world. The lines of greatest magnetic intensity, on the contrary, seemed to correspond with the localities of hurricanes and typhoons; for we find the meridian of the American magnetic pole passing not far from the Caribbean sea, and that of the Siberian pole through the China sea. He shewed that the phenomena of water-spouts were exactly the reverse of those of hurricanes, and alluded to their electrical states. He mentioned two instances of water-spouts, one in the northern the other in the southern hemisphere, in which the revolutions were in opposite directions, but both in the contrary direction to great storms. He explained the variable high winds of our latitudes, by the storms expanding in size and diminishing in force as they approach the poles, and the meridians at the same time nearing each other, occasioning a huddling together of the gales. He further remarked, because the diameters of these circles, over which the whirl of the storm was spread, often extended from 1000 to 1800 miles, observations made in the meteorological stations in the British isles, however valuable for other purposes, would not, by themselves, suffice for throwing light on this question.

The celebrated American philosopher, Professor Bache of Philadelphia, brought forward a rival, but unsatisfactory theory of storms-that proposed by the ingenious Mr. Espy of Philadelphia. Sir John HerColonel Reid illustrated his views by reference to schel said he had received from Mr. Redfield his pavarious circumstances connected with the great hurri-pers on this subject, and embraced this opportunity of cane of 1780, and the position of the several ships of publicly expressing his thanks, and of stating the great Sir George Rodney's squadron, as also those of the pleasure he had derived from their perusal. It was East India convoys in the hurricanes of 1808 and 1809. not only at sea that the practical value of this splendid He pointed out the effects of these storms on the ba- discovery respecting hurricanes would develope itself rometer and sympiesometer, and the practical lessons in enabling the sailor to escape its violence, instead of to be derived from their indications. He highly eulo- running ignorantly into the very jaws of destruction, gized the anemometers of Professor Whewell and Mr. by attempting to run away; but even on land it would Follett Ossler, and particularly dwelt upon the im- suggest invaluable hints for the securing of life and portance of having the latter instrument placed at va- property. One or two circumstances connected with rious stations in the usual tracks of these great hurri- Colonel Reid's charts particularly impressed him. The canes, as a means of deciding several important ques- first was the curious parabolic shape of the curves detions connected with them. He likewise pointed out noting the progress of these storms, so well calculated the value of inducing the several maritime nations to to give unfailing directions as to the nature and course establish registers at their light-houses, and mutually of a storm when accidentally encountered at sea, as the to communicate their observations, from which would sailor had only to consider the parts of these curves in result a fund of most valuable information, which which he was placed, and the veering of the wind, and would doubtless throw light on this, and on other col- he had almost placed before him a chart of the hurrilateral subjects. He pointed out the coincidences cane. He next threw out the suggestion for Colonel which existed between the revolving motions of storms Reid's consideration, whether the Gulf Stream would in the two hemispheres, and those which galvanism not perhaps give a clue to the direction of these curves,

The Arabian Nights' Entertainments: with Copious offered to the public by such writers if they were not

"In investigating this subject, it is necessary, in the first place, to state, that there is a kind of wine which Muslims are permitted to drink. It is properly called 'nebeedh' (a name which is now given "In a palace, or large house, there is generally a to prohibited kinds of wine), and is generally prepared wide bench of stone, or a wooden sofa, within the by putting dry grapes, or dry dates, in water, to extract outer door, for the accommodation of the door-keeper their sweetness, and suffering the liquor to ferment and other servants. The entrance-passage leads to an slightly, until it acquires a little sharpness or pungenopen court, and, for the sake of preventing persons at cy. The Prophet himself was in the habit of drinking the entrance, or a little within it, from seeing into the wine of this kind, which was prepared for him in the court, it usually has two turnings. We may, there- first part of the night; he drank it on the first and fore, understand the motive of the King in seating him- second days following; but if any remained on the self in the place here described to have been a desire morning of the third day, he either gave it to his serthat he might not, if discovered, be supposed to be pry-vants or ordered it to be poured out upon the ground. ing impertinently into the interior of the palace. Re- Such beverages have, therefore, been drunk by the VOL. XXXIV.-DECEMBER, 1838.

strictest of his followers; and Ibn Khaldoon strongly of Cairo, is well known to his intimate acquaintances