TO DOCTOR ——[6], OF BOSTON.
Water-Spouts and Whirlwinds compared.
Read at the Royal Society, June 24, 1756.
Philadelphia, Feb. 4, 1753.
Sir,
I ought to have written to you, long since, in answer to yours of October 16, concerning the water-spout; but business partly, and partly a desire of procuring further information, by enquiry among my seafaring acquaintance, induced me to postpone writing, from time to time, till I am now almost ashamed to resume the subject, not knowing but you may have forgot what has been said upon it.
Nothing certainly, can be more improving to a searcher into nature, than objections judiciously made to his opinion, taken up, perhaps, too hastily: for such objections oblige him to re-study the point, consider every circumstance carefully, compare facts, make experiments, weigh arguments, and be slow in drawing conclusions. And hence a sure advantage results; for he either confirms a truth, before too slightly supported; or discovers an error, and receives instruction from the objector.
In this view I consider the objections and remarks you sent me, and thank you for them sincerely: but, how much soever my inclinations lead me to philosophical enquiries, I am so engaged in business, public and private, that those more pleasing pursuits are frequently interrupted, and the chain of thought, necessary to be closely continued in such disquisitions, is so broken and disjointed, that it is with difficulty I satisfy myself in any of them: and I am now not much nearer a conclusion, in this matter of the spout, than when I first read your letter.
Yet, hoping we may, in time, sift out the truth between us, I will send you my present thoughts, with some observations on your reasons on the accounts in the Transactions, and on other relations I have met with. Perhaps, while I am writing, some new light may strike me, for I shall now be obliged to consider the subject with a little more attention.
I agree with you, that, by means of a vacuum in a whirlwind, water cannot be supposed to rise in large masses to the region of the clouds; for the pressure of the surrounding atmosphere could not force it up in a continued body, or column, to a much greater height, than thirty feet. But, if there really is a vacuum in the centre, or near the axis of whirlwinds, then, I think, water may rise in such vacuum to that height, or to a less height, as the vacuum may be less perfect.