30 ANNUAL RECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



urination of the long and patient labors in this direction as in- 

 stituted by Professor Henry, and carried out to their conclu- 

 sion. The matter, as given in this paper, embraces a series of 

 tables of the daily, monthly, quarterly, and annual rain-fall at 

 numerous stations in North America, with critical discussions 

 of the scientific questions involved, and is accompanied by 

 three maps, prepared with great care, exhibiting the rain-fall 

 for the winter, the summer, and the year. Numerous impor- 

 tant generalizations are discussed in this memoir, to which 

 we refer our readers for details. 



A paper upon the winds of the northern hemisphere, by 

 Professor Coffin, was published some years ago by the Insti- 

 tution, but a new and entirely revised one is in an advanced 

 stage of preparation. The discussions and generalizations 

 with reference to temperature, barometric pressure, etc., will 

 follow in due succession. 



DIFFERENCE IN THE AMOUNT OF RAIN WITH THE HEIGHT. 



Mr. Pengelly informs us, as the result of a critical inquiry 

 on the subject, that under unobjectionable conditions, and at 

 the same station, less rain will be received by a rain-gauge 

 high above the ground than by one nearer the surface ; sec- 

 ond, that the total defect will increase with increase of height; 

 and, third, that the defect will not increase so rapidly as the 

 height. 12.4, June 29,1871,169. 



poey's new form of cloud. 



Mr. Robert H. Scott, in a recent article in Nature upon the 

 forms of cloud, referring to one mentioned by Professor Poey 

 as quite new to meteorologists, and as having been met with 

 by him on two occasions only, remarks that, according to Dr. 

 Clouston, it is common in Scotland, where it is called the 

 " pocky cloud," and is much dreaded as a prognostication of 

 stormy weather. This he describes as a series of dark, cumu- 

 lus-looking clouds, like festoons of dark drapery, over a con- 

 siderable portion of the sky, with the lower edge well defined 

 (as if each festoon, or " pock," were filled with something 

 heavy), one series of festoons generally lying over another, so 

 that the light spaces between resemble an Alpine chain of 

 white-peaked mountains. It is essential that the lower edge 

 be well defined, for a similar cloud, with the lower edge of 



