_ and whirl away to the north-eastward, regardless of the power
that originated and controls them? What must this "_tendency_" be, which
thus _occasionally_ not only diverts the winds from the _usually regular
course_ given them by their originating power, but increases their action,
from gentle, ordinary winds, to hurricanes? Nay, which gives them a new,
resistless gyratory and electric energy, increasing as the new,
independent, supposed cyclonic organization moves off, "_integrally_,"
away from "the home of its many fathers," on a devastating journey towards
the north pole?

And, further, if all this were true as to the West Indies and Central
America, what is to be said of the billions of other storms, originating
on a thousand other portions of the earth's surface, and how are they to
be accounted for, inasmuch as such other "meetings," "coming into each
other," and "over-sliding," and "tendency to deflection," is not assumed
to exist?

These questions cannot be satisfactorily answered. The distinguished
theorists are mistaken. The stratus-cloud does not over-lie or cover the
storm. IT IS THE STORM. The winds beneath, whether surface or
superimposed, are but its incidents, due to its static induction and
attraction. Their _direction_ depends on the shape of the storm cloud, and
its course of progression, and the susceptibility of the surface
atmosphere in this direction or that, to its inductive and attractive
influence. Their _force_ to its depth, its contiguity to the earth, and
the intensity of its action; and the scud, are but patches of
condensation, occasioned by the same inductive action which affects and
attracts the surface current in which they form.

Another objection to Mr. Redfield's theory of gyration is based upon the
fact that in order to constitute his _storm_, to get the _gyration_, he
has to include, at least, an equal amount, generally a great deal more, of
_fair weather_. The N. W. wind, the "posterior, or dry side of the gale,"
as he calls it (in the foregoing extract), is a _fair weather wind_. It is
_necessary_, however, to complete the supposed _circle_, and it is
_pressed into the service_. The practical answer given to the question,
"_what are storms?_" is, they are cyclones, part storm, so called, and
_part fair weather_; that is, the stratus-cloud, the scud, the easterly
wind, and rain or snow of day before yesterday, were the _wet side_, or
front part of the storm, and the sunshine,