88 ANNUAL EECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



order to move the most rapidly toward his haven. Mr. Gal- 

 ton considers that his idea can be put into practical use as 

 well by navigators as by the closet student of meteorology, 

 and that it will be found that no degree of precision of me- 

 teorological knowledge need be thrown away in the practice 

 of navigation. Pr. Royal Society, 1873, 270. 



SIGNAL STATIONS IN THE DOMINION OF CANADA. 



The Dominion government has established a series of sta- 

 tions for meteorological and storm-signal purposes in New 

 Brunswick and Nova Scotia, which are to be put into tele- 

 graphic communication with the Signal Service Department 

 in Washington, although the advantages accruing to the 

 provinces will be much greater than to the United States. 

 The proposed stations are, for New Brunswick, at St. John, 

 St. Andrew's, Schediac, and Gaspe; in Nova Scotia, at Hali- 

 fax, Pictou, Yarmouth, Sydney, Cow Bay, and Little Glace 

 Bay. 



THE REDUCTION OE BAROMETRIC OBSERVATIONS TO THE SEA- 

 LEVEL. 



The recent publication, by Dr. Hann, of a short essay, in 

 which he throws great doubt upon the propriety of the ordi- 

 nary methods of reducing barometric observations to sea-level, 

 and even virtually acknowledges that it is impossible to effect 

 this reduction without introducing gross errors, has had the 

 effect of drawing from Wild, of St. Petersburg, and from Jel- 

 inek, of Vienna, two most interesting and valuable statements 

 of the reasons why they prefer to continue to adhere to the 

 methods recommended by the Vienna Congress in 1873. The 

 method proposed by Wild, which he states has recently been 

 adopted by himself for all the Russian observations, is a 

 somewhat peculiar mixture of three different methods adapt- 

 ed to three different classes of meteorological stations, and if 

 we rightly apprehend the objections that he urges to Dr. 

 Hann's propositions, they amount simply to this : that the so- 

 called deviations between the individual and the normal val- 

 ues of barometric pressure require themselves to be reduced 

 to sea-level, although this at present is rarely or never 

 thought of, and that in this reduction errors would necessari- 

 ly be introduced perfectly comparable in their importance to 



