THE ATLANTIC OCEAN ITS RIVER SYSTEMS We have already briefly enumerated the principal rivers flowing into the Atlantic, which receives several of the largest rivers of the globe. Although the Atlantic is scarcely half the size of the Pacific, yet its drainage area is 2i times greater, being 19,050,000 square miles, while that of the Pacific is only 8,460,000 square miles. The position of the Rocky Mountains and the Andes, and in a less marked manner the watersheds of Central Europe and Africa, deter mines the course of by far the larger number of the great rivers of the globe, either directly or indirectly, into the Atlantic.
The Atlantic river-systems may be naturally divided into four sections, according to the continent over which they flow. A brief tabulated statement of the principal rivers can only be given here ; the student will find full particulars in the " Geography of River-Systems." 1 In the following table