Atlantic City
a city and noted Beach; 60 miles S. E. of Philadelphia, with which it is connected by steam and electric railroads. The island stretches of sea lying between the W. coasts of Europe and Africa and the E. coasts of miles. The principal inlets and bays are Baffin and Hudson Bays, the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean Sea, the North Sea, or German Ocean, the Bay of Biscay, and the Gulf of Guinea. The principal islands N. of the equator are Iceland, the Faroe and British Islands, the Azores, Canaries, and Cape de Verde Islands, Newfoundland, Cape Breton, and the West India Islands; and S. of the equator, Ascension, St. Helena, and Tristan da Cunha.
Principal Currents. - The great currents of the Atlantic are the Equatorial current (divisible into the main, northern, and southern equatorial currents), the Gulf Stream, the north African and Guinea current, the southern connecting current, the southern Atlantic current, the the Cape Horn current, Rennels current, and the Arctic current. The current system is primarily set in motion by the trade winds which drive the water of toward the American coasts. Besides the surface currents, an under current of equator, and an upper current of warm water from the equator toward the poles.
Depths. The greatest depth yet discovered is N. of Porto Ri Rico, in the West covered is N. of Porto Rico, in the West tions of the North Atlantic between Europe and America show that its bed consists of two great valleys lying in a north and south direction, and separated by a ridge, on which there is an average ATLANTISdepth of 1,600 or 1,700 fathoms, while the valleys on either side sink to the depth of 3,000 or 4,000 fathoms. A ridge, called the Wyville-Thomson Ridge, with a depth of little more than 200 fathoms above it, runs from near the Butt of Lewis to Iceland, cutting off the colder water of the Arctic Ocean from the warmer water of the Atlantic. The South Atlantic, of which the greatest depth yet found is over 3,000 fathoms, resembles the North Atlantic in having an elevated plateau or ridge in the center, with a deep trough on either side.
The saltiness and specific gravity of the Atlantic gradually diminish from the tropics to the poles, and also from within a short distance of the tropics to the equator. In the neighborhood of the British Isles the salt has been stated at one-thirty-eighth of the weight of the water. The North Atlantic is the greatest highway of ocean traffic in the world.