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Depth of the Ocean

About This Item

  • Title: Depth of the Ocean
  • Date: 21 February 1857
  • Creator(s): Walt Whitman
  • Whitman Archive ID: per.01340
  • Source: Brooklyn Daily Times, 21 February 1857: 2. Our transcription is based on a digital image of a microfilm scan of the original issue. Microfilm of original issue held at Pennsylvania State University Libraries. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the journalism, see our statement of editorial policy.
  • Editorial note: This piece is unsigned, as was the case for most of Whitman's journalism. However, this editorial is part of a series of texts that deal with a coherent theme that has been identified by the Whitman Archive journalism team as likely authored by Whitman. This decision is based on a combination of historical and (auto)biographical accounts, similarity to contemporary Whitman writings, a history of scholarly attribution, extant clippings retained by Whitman, computational stylometric analysis, and, in some cases, manuscript evidence in Whitman’s hand.
  • Contributors to digital file: Kaylen Michaelis Kevin McMullen Karie Cobb
  • Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Depth of the Ocean." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 16 July 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: per.01340.xml (TEI)
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DEPTH OF THE OCEAN.—

For some years tide-observations have been made round the coasts of Ireland, for the purpose of discovering the various phenomena connected with the tides, currents, &c., and so facilitating navigation. Among the results obtained, there is one which at the first glance appears all but impossible. The Rev. Prof. Haughton, of the Royal Irish Academy, has been enabled, by ingenious calculations based on these tide-observations, to infer the depth of the ocean. One of his conclusions, omitting fractions, is eleven miles; the other, five miles. The first is the depth of the vast central channel, up which the great tidal wave rolls from the antarctic pole; the second is the mean depth of the whole Atlantic Ocean.

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