EXERCISE ON THE FOREGOING STUDY.

To be translated into German, and corrected by the German version given below. The German poem should first be learnt by heart.

I have seen the high castle by the sea. The clouds blow over it. I saw the king and his consort walking above. They had not red cloaks; they had black mourning garments. They did not lead the beautiful maiden, glorious as the sun. I saw the parents. They had not crowns-and I saw not the maiden. I saw the moon stand over the castle, and mists far around.

German Version.

Ich habe das hohe Schloß am Meere Ich habe dass hoe schloss am mairre gesehen. Die Wolken wehen darüber ge-zay'-en Dee voll'-ken vay'-en darue' berr her. Ich sah den König und seine Gehairr Ich zah dane koe'-nich unt zi'-ne gemahlin oben gehen. Sie hatten nicht mahl'-in o'-ben gay'-en zee hat-ten nicht rothe Mäntel; fie hatten schwarze roh-te men'-tel' zee hat-ten

shvart'-se

sah

ich

nicht.

Trauerkleider. Sie führten nicht die trow'-err-kly'-derr zee fuehrten nicht dee schöne Jungfrau, herrlich wie die Sonne. shoek'-ne yung-fron hairr-lich vee dee zon'-ne. Ich sah die Eltern. Sie hatten nicht Ich zah dee el'-tern zee hat'-ten nicht Kronen; und ich sah nicht die Jungfrau. kro-nen unt ich zah nicht dee yung-frow

Ich sah den Mond über dem Schloffe Ich zah den moand ue-berr dame shlos-se stehen, und Nebel weit umher. stay'-en unt nay'-bel vite um-hairr'.

PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY

VII.

OCEAN CURRENTS.

THE water of the ocean is perpetually moving, not only on the surface, but by the action of

currents, or immense streams moving around and about the surface of the globe, in obedience to certain motive forces. These are principally, the force of winds; the tidal force (explained hereafter); differences of temperature, which expand or contract water by heat and cold; the evaporating power of the sun; melting of masses of ices at the poles; and the revolution of the earth about its axis. There are drift currents and stream currents, the Varied currents. former due to the action of winds upon the surface water, impelling it to leeward (or in a direction contrary to that from which the wind is blowing), until, meeting with some obstacle, land or sandbanks, its progress is arrested, and an accumulation of water produced. The drift current then gives rise to a stream current, carrying off the collected waters, and restoring the equilibrium of the surface of the ocean. The average velocity of a drift current is about half a mile an hour; that of a stream current is not unfrequently five miles an hour. There are also periodical, constant, variable, and counter currents. Periodical currents occur at certain seasons of the year, the time of which is generally known to navigators, and are due to the action of tides and winds, especially monsoons-those winds which, in the Indian Ocean, blow from the south-west from April to October, and from the north-east from October to April, the two periods of change being generally accompanied by great atmospherical disturbance. Constant currents are, as the name implies, in continual operation-the great oceanic rivers, as they have been named, perpetually flowing. Variable currents are occasioned by the action of the tides, changeable winds, and the melting of ice, which is obviously uncertain as to period or duration. Counter currents are those remarkable streams that flow alongside other currents, but in opposite directions. These are in some instances very remarkable, as a cold current will be observed running southward in immediate proximity to a hot current having a northward direction.

The most remarkable currents are in the Atlantic Ocean, and they have been most

Atlantic currents.

accurately observed by scientific navigators. The South Atlantic current flows round the Cape of Good Hope from the Indian Ocean, and follows the course of the African coast nearly as far as the equator, with an average breadth of about sixty miles, and a velocity of a mile an hour. It then diverges westward, forming the powerful Equatorial current, and flowing with increased extent and velocity to the South American coast, where it divides into two branches, the southern being known as the Brazil current, extending as far as the mouth of the La Plata river, and the northern entering the Gulf of Mexico between Cuba and the peninsula of Yucatan, following the coast line to the delta of the Mississippi. Here, as we have already observed, the temperature of the ocean is higher than in any other part of the world, and the current, thereafter known as the Gulf Stream, carries onward a stream of hot water, travelling at the rate of five miles an hour,

through the Strait of Florida, into the Atlantie Ocean, following the American coast as far as Cape Hatteras, in North Carolina, where it bends to the east, crosses the Atlantic to the Azores Islands, about lat. 40° N., but throwing off a north current, which strikes the western shores of Great Britain and Ireland, then skirting the coast of Norway as far as the North Cape, and the effect is sometimes felt as high as Spitzbergen. The great stream of hot water thus carried northward accounts for the high temperature of north-western Europe as compared with those parts of North America lying under the same latitudes. The district about North Cape is habitable, but in almost corresponding latitudes of the western hemisphere are the "thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice," where so many brave Arctic explorers have encountered a terrible death. Near the Azores, after a circuit of more than 3,000 miles from the Strait of Florida, the main stream of the current passes Gibraltar, Madeira, and the Canaries, becoming at last mingled with the great Equatorial current, the circuit having been completed in about two years and ten months. In the centre of the circle formed by the going out and returning currents is a vast mass of floating seaweed, known as the Sargasso Sea, the "seaweed meadows of the early Spanish navigators. The course of the current which we have traced is clearly perceptible, the water being salter, and of a deeper blue colour, and of a higher temperature than the surrounding sea. One of the facts which greatly impressed Columbus before undertaking his great voyage of discovery was the drifting of the bodies of men of unknown race to the shores of the Azores. They were doubtless American Indians, carried forward by the Gulf Stream and deposited on the shores of an Atlantic island-unconscious messengers from the New World to the Old. An Arctic current of cold water, bearing many icebergs, flows from the Arctic Ocean to the east of the Great Bank of Newfoundland, where the meeting of the cold and hot waters produce the fogs which mark that region. There are several smaller and less important currents

Pacific

The currents of the Pacific are less accurately known than those of the Atlantic, but navigators are daily increasing our knowledge of the subject. The great Antarctic drift cur- currents. rent, flowing from the icy regions of the extreme south, strikes the southern point of Terra del Fuego, at Cape Horn, from which it takes its name, dividing into two branches, one flowing toward the Atlantic, the other in a northerly direction, following the coast line as far as Cape Blanco, about 250 miles south of the equatorial line. The latter is the Peruvian or Humboldt's current. That distinguished observer, in the course of his investigations on the western coast of South America, about the beginning of the present century, noticed that a broad stream of cold water was perpetually flowing from the south. He made careful experiments, the result of which was the discovery of a powerful current, somewhat similar in cha

racter to the well-known Atlantic Gulf-stream, and the temperature of which was from fifteen to twenty degrees below that of the surrounding ocean. When near the equator the current takes a westerly direction across the ocean, mingling with the great Equatorial drift current, which flows on either side of the equatorial line, having an average breadth of about 3,000 miles and travelling at the rate of about thirty miles a day. This immense current is divided by a smaller current-the Equatorial counter current, flowing in an opposite direction-into two branches having parallel courses. The southern branch strikes the Australian coast, and under the name of the Australian current sweeps round the south-eastern angle of the great island, and then, again taking an easterly direction, washes the shores of New Zealand. A warm current to the south of Van Diemen's Land appears to connect the Indian and Pacific Oceans. The northern branch of the great Equatorial current sweeps along the shores of the Philippine and Japanese Islands (where it has a varying velocity of from fifty to a hundred and twenty miles a day) towards Behring's Straits, through which a portion of the stream passes with considerable velocity; but the greater body of water is carried towards the American coast which it follows till near the Californian peninsula, when it turns westward, and completes a sort of circle by reentering the Great Current.

Indian Ocean.

There are various currents in the Indian Ocean, some dependent on the monsoons. The most important are the equatorial, Currents of the or Passage Drift Current, originating to the south-west of Australia, flowing northwards to the Tropic of Capricorn, then turning to the west and sweeping across the ocean to the north of Madagascar; and the Mozambique current, a continuation of the preceding, but far more powerful and rapid, having a velocity of nearly six miles an hour in some parts, and flowing through the Mozambique Channel to the south extremity of Africa.

HISTORY OF MODERN TIMES.

VIII.

THE REIGN OF THE EMPEROR CHARLES V.

Part I.

SINCE the time of Charlemagne, the great founder of the German empire, who died at Aix-la-Chapelle in 814, no king had possessed such an extent of territory as that which, in the first half of the sixteenth century, acknowledged the sway of the great Emperor Charles V. This mighty ruler is, during more than thirtyfive years, the most prominent personage on the stage of the world; and the history of Charles is the history of Europe. Nothing in

the outward appearance of the great emperor indicated the unwearied activity and the acuteness of his mind. Charles V. of His portraits, as painted by old Lucas Kranach and others, exhibit

Germany (1500-1558).

a melancholy countenance, "sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought"-the face of a man weary of life and its burdens; nor do they greatly belie the feeling of the ruler whom they represent. For Charles undertook a task too great for a man to carry through, and indeed impossible in the century in which he lived. His great aim was to give unity once more to a dismembered empire and a shattered church; to restore to the tarnished imperial crown its pristine lustre, and once more to raise the imperial sceptre as the defender of the papal chair; to be in Europe what that great Charles had been who founded the German empire seven centuries before. But the clock of the world could not thus be put back. Intelligence and the spirit of liberty were irresistible; and the universal monarchy of which he dreamt was not to be established in Europe even by his untiring energy and perseverance. And thus in the great objects of his life he failed.

Character of

Charles V.

That Charles was a man of great and rare ability, is undeniable. Close and taciturn, he kept his plans to himself, and followed them out perseveringly through years of difficulty and discouragement. Sagacious in divining the thoughts and characters of men, he listened readily to the suggestions of grave and experienced statesmen; deliberate and far-seeing, he readily took advantage of the errors committed by his enemies; and in pursuing his ends used every means, even duplicity and falsehood. The extent of his dominions was enormous. The marriage of his paternal grandparents, Maximilian of Austria and Mary, daughter and heiress of Charles the Bold of Burgundy, gave him the inheritance of the great Austrian territories and of the Netherlands. To the Netherlands he succeeded in

dominions.

his early years, at the death of His vast his father Philip the Handsome; and in 1519 the death of his grandfather Maximilian put him in possession of the Austrian inheritance. A grand legacy, that of the great Spanish monarchy, fell to him at the death of Ferdinand of Aragon, his maternal grandfather; for Ferdinand and his queen Isabella of Castile were the parents of that unhappy Joanna, who was wedded to Philip the Handsome, and whose grief at the death of her husband darkened into incurable madness. The beautiful kingdom of Naples and Sicily, and the wealthy and fruitful lands lately discovered in the West India Islands and the mainland of America, filled up the measure of a kingdom of which it could with truth be said that the sun never set upon it. But many difficulties and dangers were connected with the government of this vast empire, consisting of various nations, each with its separate manners, customs, and prejudices. In the Netherlands the great commercial

Difficulties in ruling his empire.

currents, or immense streams moving around and about the surface of the globe, in obedience to certain motive forces. These are principally, the force of winds; the tidal force (explained hereafter); differences of temperature, which expand or contract water by heat and cold; the evaporating power of the sun; melting of masses of ices at the poles; and the revolution of the earth about its axis. There are drift currents and stream currents, the Varied currents. former due to the action of winds upon the surface water, impelling it to leeward (or in a direction contrary to that from which the wind is blowing), until, meeting with some obstacle, land or sandbanks, its progress is arrested, and an accumulation of water produced. The drift current then gives rise to a stream current, carrying off the collected waters, and restoring the equilibrium of the surface of the ocean. The average velocity of a drift current is about half a mile an hour; that of a stream current is not unfrequently five miles an hour. There are also periodical, constant, variable, and counter currents. Periodical currents occur at certain seasons of the year, the time of which is generally known to navigators, and are due to the action of tides and winds, especially monsoons-those winds which, in the Indian Ocean, blow from the south-west from April to October, and from the north-east from October to April, the two periods of change being generally accompanied by great atmospherical disturbance. Constant currents are, as the name implies, in continual operation-the great oceanic rivers, as they have been named, perpetually flowing. Variable currents are occasioned by the action of the tides, changeable winds, and the melting of ice, which is obviously uncertain as to period or duration. Counter currents are those remarkable streams that flow alongside other currents, but in opposite directions. These are in some instances very remarkable, as a cold current will be observed running southward in immediate proximity to a hot current having a northward direction.

Atlantic

The most remarkable currents are in the Atlantic Ocean, and they have been most accurately observed by scientific navigators. The South Atlantic currents. current flows round the Cape of Good Hope from the Indian Ocean, and follows the course of the African coast nearly as far as the equator, with an average breadth of about sixty miles, and a velocity of a mile an hour. It then diverges westward, forming the powerful Equatorial current, and flowing with increased extent and velocity to the South American coast, where it divides into two branches, the southern being known as the Brazil current, extending as far as the mouth of the La Plata river, and the northern entering the Gulf of Mexico between Cuba and the peninsula of Yucatan, following the coast line to the delta of the Mississippi. Here, as we have already observed, the temperature of the ocean is higher than in any other part of the world, and the current, thereafter known as the Gulf Stream, carries onward a stream of hot water, travelling at the rate of five miles an hour,

through the Strait of Florida, into the Atlantie Ocean, following the American coast as far as Cape Hatteras, in North Carolina, where it bends to the east, crosses the Atlantic to the Azores Islands, about lat. 40° N., but throwing off a north current, which strikes the western shores of Great Britain and Ireland, then skirting the coast of Norway as far as the North Cape, and the effect is sometimes felt as high as Spitzbergen. The great stream of hot water thus carried northward accounts for the high temperature of north-western Europe as compared with those parts of North America lying under the same latitudes. The district about North Cape is habitable, but in almost corresponding latitudes of the western hemisphere are the "thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice," where so many brave Arctic explorers have encountered a terrible death. Near the Azores, after a circuit of more than 3,000 miles from the Strait of Florida, the main stream of the current passes Gibraltar, Madeira, and the Canaries, becoming at last mingled with the great Equatorial current, the circuit having been completed in about two years and ten months. In the centre of the circle formed by the going out and returning currents is a vast mass of floating seaweed, known as the Sargasso Sea, the "seaweed meadows" of the early Spanish navigators. The course of the current which we have traced is clearly perceptible, the water being salter, and of a deeper blue colour, and of a higher temperature than the surrounding sea. One of the facts which greatly impressed Columbus before undertaking his great voyage of discovery was the drifting of the bodies of men of unknown race to the shores of the Azores. They were doubtless American Indians, carried forward by the Gulf Stream and deposited on the shores of an Atlantic island- unconscious messengers from the New World to the Old. An Arctic current of cold water, bearing many icebergs, flows from the Arctic Ocean to the east of the Great Bank of Newfoundland, where the meeting of the cold and hot waters produce the fogs which mark that region. There are several smaller and less important currents

The currents of the Pacific are less accurately known than those of the Atlantic, but navigators are daily increasing

currents.

our knowledge of the subject. Pacific The great Antarctic drift ourrent, flowing from the icy regions of the extreme south, strikes the southern point of Terra del Fuego, at Cape Horn, from which it takes its name, dividing into two branches, one flowing toward the Atlantic, the other in a northerly direction, following the coast line as far as Cape Blanco, about 250 miles south of the equatorial line. The latter is the Peruvian or Humboldt's current. That distinguished observer, in the course of his investigations on the western coast of South America, about the beginning of the present century, noticed that a broad stream of cold water was perpetualfflowing from the south. He made en periments, the result of which was of a powerful current, somew