46 ANNUAL RECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



Signal Service branch of the War Department of the United 

 States, under General Myer, as is well known to most of our 

 readers. The day signal here consists of a flag instead of a 

 drum, and is likewise intended only to indicate the probable 

 approach of a storm, blowing at the rate of at least thirty 

 miles j:>er hour. The short time during which this system 

 has been in operation has been sufficient to prove its value, 

 and, during the late severe gales all over the country, much 

 loss of life and property has been prevented by proper atten- 

 tion to the intimations given. 



For a considerable time the Signal Office has given tele- 

 graphic announcements of the probabilities of the weather, 

 and we learn from an abstract of the report of the chief sig- 

 nal officer, General Myer, that sixty-five per cent, of these 

 prognostications have been verified by the result ; and, as the 

 theory of atmospheric disturbances is better understood, the 

 percentage of verifications will continually increase. 3 A, 

 Nov. 11,1871,368. 



BRITISH WEATHER MAP. 



The Meteorological Office of Great Britain proposes to is- 

 sue lithographic charts illustrative of the daily weather re- 

 port. These will be forwarded from the office of the printer 

 between 1 and 2 o'clock P.M. each day, and sent to any part 

 of the kingdom, upon payment of five shillings per quarter. 

 In addition to the returns from forty stations, charts of the 

 British Isles and a portion of the Continent are given, show- 

 ing the movements of the barometer and thermometer, the 

 conditions of the wind and sea, and the quantity of cloud and 

 rain. The rapid dissemination of this information can not 

 fail to be of great value to Great Britain, as is shown by the 

 success which has attended a similar enterprise of the Amer- 

 ican Signal Service, of which we are so justly proud, and 

 which has been in operation for a considerable time, embrac- 

 ing much more minuteness of detail than is proposed for the 

 English maps. 15 A,3Iarch 16, 1872, 339. 



LAWS OF THE WINDS IX EUROPE. 



A work has recently been published by Mr. W. Clement 

 Ley upon the laws of the winds in Western Europe, contain- 

 ing some important generalizations which maybe of interest 



