CALM, the state of rest which appears in the air
and sea when there is no wind stirring. A calm is
more dreaded by a seafaring man than a storm, if he
has a strong ship and sea room enough; for, under the
line excessive heat sometimes produces such dead calms,
that ships are obliged to stay two or three months with-
out being able to stir one way or other. Two opposite
winds will sometimes make a calm. This is frequently
observed in the gulf of Mexico, at no great distance
from the shore, where some gulf or land wind will
so poise the general easterly wind, as to produce a per-
fect calm.
Calms are never so great on the ocean as on the
Mediterranean, because the flux and reflux of the
former keep the water in a continual agitation, even
where there is no wind; whereas there being no tides
in the latter, the calm is sometimes so dead, that the
face of the water is as clear as a looking glass; but
such calms are almost constant prefaces of an approach-
ing storm. On the coasts about Smyrna, a long calm
is reputed a prognostic of an earthquake.
It is not uncommon for the vessels to be calmed, or
becalmed, as the sailors express it, in the road of the
constant Levantine winds, in places where they ride
near the land. Thus between the two capes of Car-
toche towards the main, and Cape Antonio in Cuba,
the sea is narrow, and there is often a calm produced
by some gust of a land wind, that poises the Levantine
wind, and renders the whole perfectly still for two or
three days. In this case, the current that runs here is
of use to the vessels, if it sets right; when it sets easter-
ly, a ship will have a passage in three or four days to
the Havannah; but if otherwise, it is often a fortnight
or three weeks sail, the ship being embayed in the gulf
of Mexico.
When the weather is perfectly calm, no wind at all
stirring, the sailors try which way the current sets, by
VOL. V. Part I.
means of a boat which they send out, and which will
ride at anchor, though there is no bottom to be found,
as regularly and well as if fastened by the strongest an-
chor to the bottom. The method is this: they row
the boat to a little distance from the ship, and then
throw over their plummet, which is about forty pounds
weight; they let this sink to about two hundred
fathoms; and then, though it never reaches the bottom,
the boat will turn head against the current, and ride as
firmly as can be.