Here it assumes a new name, and forms what navigators call the _Gulf-stream_, a rapid current of tepid water, which, flowing in a diagonal direction, recedes farther and farther from the coast of North America as it advances to the north-east. Under the forty-first degree of latitude it suddenly bends to the east, gradually diminishing in swiftness, and at the same time increasing in width. Thus it flows across the Atlantic, to the south of the great bank of Newfoundland, where Humboldt found the temperature of its stream several degrees higher than that of the neighbouring and tranquil waters, which form, as it were, the banks of the warm oceanic current. Ere it reaches the western Azores, it divides into two arms, one of which is driven, partly by the natural impulse of its stream, but principally by the prevailing westerly and north-westerly winds, towards the coasts of Europe; while the other, flowing towards the Canary Islands and the western coast of Africa, finally returns into the equatorial current. In this manner the waters are brought back to the point from which they came, after having performed a vast circuit of 20,000 miles, which it took them nearly three years to accomplish. According to Humboldt's calculations, a boat left to the current, and moving along without any other assistance, would require about thirteen months to float from the Canary Islands to the Caribbean Sea as far as Caraccas. From Caraccas to the Straits of Florida, it would remain another ten months on the way, for though the direct distance is but short, the current has to perform an enormous circuit of 2500 miles, and flows but slowly in those confined seas. But the accumulated waters having now to force their passage through the narrow channel between Cuba and the Bahama Islands on one side, and Florida on the other, attain so considerable a velocity, that the whole distance from the Havannah to the Bank of Newfoundland, is traversed in forty days. During this passage the Gulf-stream particularly deserves its name, and is easily distinguished from the surrounding waters by its higher temperature and its vivid dark blue colour. Numerous marine animals of the tropical seas,--the flying fish, the neat velella, the purple ianthina, the crosier nautilus, accompany it to latitudes which otherwise would prove fatal to their existence; and, trusting its tepid stream, float or swim along to the north or the north-east. At the extremity of the Bank of Newfoundland, it becomes broader, wavers more or less in its course, according to the prevailing winds, and at the same time decreases in rapidity, so that the boat would most likely still require from ten to eleven months for this last station of its journey, ere it once more reached the Canary Islands.