17 THE WIND-ITS VELOCITY-TRADE WINDS-THE GOLDEN-CRESTED WREN WERE you not alarmed with the wind last night, I heard it, Edward, but was not much alarmed. I Certainly, there is something very grand in the They do occasionally; you recollect, last winter C trees in our beautiful avenue. And in each tempest, many vessels sink into the ocean, to rise no more. I am far from affirming, Edward, that storms do not often do much mischief. This, however, is one of the many ways in which the great Sovereign makes his creatures feel that he reigns, and that they are as nothing before him. Did he not do so, occasionally at least, the world would be full of impiety and atheism. Yet it cannot be denied, but that, on the whole, storms do much more good than harm; they scatter the noxious vapours, which would otherwise fill the air with disease and death. They cool the regions of the torrid zone, which, perhaps, would not be habitable without them. And, no doubt, they are useful in various ways with which we are unacquainted. Our mind should always be tranquillized by the certainty, that the most dreadful tempests are under the Divine control; God says to the impetuous winds, "Hitherto shall ye come; but no farther!" I should like to know, at what rate such a storm as that last night would drive a ship. Do you know, Papa? Not exactly; but calculations have been made on the speed at which the air is impelled in various degrees of wind, which approach very near to the truth, A wind, scarcely perceptible, it is thought, moves at the rate of a mile an hour; a gentle pleasant breeze at the rate of four or five miles in the same time. A brisk gale advances onward from ten to fifteen miles; and a very brisk gale from twenty to twenty-five. High winds, such as those of the last night, proceed from thirty to forty-five miles. And tempests move from fifty to eighty in the hour. Hurricanes in the West Indies, which tear up plantations and houses, are supposed to fly at the rate of one hundred miles in the same time, or even more. I was reading in Cook's voyages, that at a particular place, he took advantage of the trade winds; what are these, Papa? They are winds which always blow in one direction for a certain time, which is well-known, at a particular period of the year. Thus the monsoons blow for one half of the year in a direction from the coast of India; and the other half in a direction towards that continent; and, of course, as this is well known, navigators take care to profit by the information, and make their voyages at such times as always to have favourable winds. It is not improbable, that some species of birds take advantage of favourable winds to migrate from one country to another. Some of these have already returned to our island; and all our usual residents will shortly be here. See, Papa, what a beautiful little bird that is which is hanging from that bough; what can it be? It is as fine as a humming bird, and has a golden tuft on its head. Stand still, and do not frighten it away. Is it not a humming bird, Papa? No, Edward, there are none in our country; this is the golden-crested Wren. It is, indeed, as you properly called it, a beautiful creature, and is the smallest of our British birds; it rarely weighs more than a drachm. Many of them, it is said, migrateI have myself caught one, which was wearied with long flight, on board ship many leagues at sea; but a few of them stay the whole of the year. This one no doubt was looking in the crevices of the bark of the oak, for insects on which it feeds. I know the bird well. It is a native of Asia and America, as well as of Europe. It raises, sinks, or hides its orangecoloured crest just as it pleases. The neck and back are of a dark green. Its eyes are surrounded with a white circle; and its tail is brown, formed of twelve feathers, about an inch and a half long; but it is not forked, like those of other birds. It sings very |