'Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society, from January 1847 to May 1849. Edited by the Secretary. Volume VIII.' [‎28] (131/496)

On the eastern side of the focus, the wind, storm-wave, and cur
rent, were all following the same direction along the coast. Thus it
appears, by a correspondent of the Madras Circulator, that
“ Calicut the sea was so rough, and the current towards the North so
« strong, that several pattimars which were anchored in the roads,
“ and a French ship called the Erneste, were obliged to slip their
“ cables and run out to sea. You may form an idea of the strength
“ of the current from the fact that the Schooner Nymph, which left
“ Cochin for Colombo, was carried away far towards the north, and,
“ becoming unmanageable, struck on a reef of rocks off Tellicherry,
“where she is now lying a wreck/ ,
While a body of water was thus carried along the eastern side of
the Arabian sea, it would naturally have flowed to the westward in
front of the storm-wave and turned to the southward beyond the
influence of the gale. The H. C. Steamer Auckland, on the passage
from Aden to Bombay, first experienced this southerly current at the
rate of fourteen miles per diem, on the 25th, in Long. 62° East, and
found it to continue till the 28th, when she was in Long. 72° E.
The state of the sea seems to have been such as is usually met
with during hurricanes. The nearer the centre the more “ cross,”
“ confused,” and broken were the waves, and, as might be expected
when tossed by violent wind in angry collision, they rose up in “py*
“ ramidal masses,” thereby increasing the danger to ships in a
manifold degree. A long heavy swell seems to have extended to
many hundred miles beyond the area of the storm, and ought to have
tpld of what was going on. The Faize Rubahny first experienced
a heavy “ confused sea” on the 15th, when off Mangalore, two days
before the vortex reached her.
Causes —In addition to the importance of the subject as affecting
the lives and happiness of a large proportion of the human race, it must
be confessed that a keen and abstract interest in the theory of
storms has induced us to prosecute our research in spite of not a few
unforeseen and even repelling obstacles. The hope, however vain,
o penetrating into the mysterious forces which set this might?
empest in motion, alone leads us through a dry detail of almost dis
cordant facts. . The accumulation of facts is subservient to the dis
covery o principles, and a theory is absolutely necessary to guide us
1Q their arran genient. It may, therefore, be permitted us, without