Unpublished paper, 'A few remarks on currents in the Arctic seas' by P C Sutherland

Description

Sutherland explains that, during a recent voyage in the Arctic seas, his attention was arrested by the power exerted by refrigeration and congelation in separating from water any saline ingredients it may contain, and of thus causing disturbances in the mean density of the waters of the ocean, which, after being influenced by currents, can be overcome only by subsequent intermixture with water from other localities where the disturbance in the equilibrium is of an opposite character. He considers that evaporation, which is so active within the tropical and temperate zones, obviously renders the sea more dense by depressing its surface, and thus gives rise to the necessity for currents from the two poles of the earth, where deposition of vapour predominates to a considerable extent over evaporation.

Includes ten pages of meteorological observations. Annotations in pencil throughout.

Subject: Hydrology / Meteorology

Received 16 April 1853. Communicated by Col [William Henry] Sykes.

Whilst the Royal Society declined to publish this paper in full, an abstract of the paper was published in volume 6 of Abstracts of the Papers Printed in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London [later Proceedings of the Royal Society] as 'A few remarks on currents in the Arctic seas'.

Reference number

AP/35/3

Earliest possible date

March 1853

Physical description

Ink and graphite pencil on paper

Page extent

49 pages

Format

Manuscript