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Chap. II.]
AFRICAN COAST.
33
1840
discoloured, we tried for, but did not obtain, soundings, with one hundred and thirty fathoms of line.
By 1 p.m., the next day, the temperature of the March 8sea had fallen from 70° to 56°5, that of the air being 65°, and the mist unpleasantly cold to our feelings. We were at this time in lat. 32° 21′ S. long. 17° 6′ E., therefore about forty-five miles from Paternoster Point, when we struck soundings in one hundred and twenty-seven fathoms, on a bed of fine dark sand. We had expected to have found an elevation in the temperature both of the air and sea on our approach to the African coast, by reason of the radiation of heat from its shores; but the cause of the depression became evident on the morning of the 9th, when, having sighted Cape March 9.Paternoster at daylight, we found we had to contend against a current increasing in strength and coldness of temperature as we neared the land. The existence of a body of cold water rushing from the eastward, round the Cape of Good Hope, has long been suspected; but, its extension so far to the northward has not, I believe, been before noticed. As we were several days beating up to the Cape we collected the following curious facts respecting it. Thus on the 7th, when distant one hundred and twenty miles from the coast, and before we perceived the effects of the current, the temperature of the air was 71°, that of the sea 70°, and the depth of water more than four hundred