THE WEATHER VS. THE NEWSPAPERS. 381 



THE WEATHER VS. THE NEWSPAPERS. 



By HARVEY MAITLAND WATTS. 



THE PHILADELPHIA ' PRESS.' 



U A PKIL 4, 1668. I did attend the Duke of York and he did 

 .XJL carry us to the King's lodgings; but he was asleep in his 

 closet; so we stayed in the green-room; where the Duke of York did 

 tell us what rule he had of knowing the weather; and did now tell us 

 we should have rain before to-morrow (it having been a dry season 

 for some time) and so it did rain all night almost; and pretty rules he 

 hath, and told Brouncker and me some of them, which were such as 

 no reason can readily be given for them." — Pepys' Diary. 



In 1668 the inquisitive Pepys had warrant for his exclusion of 

 weather lore from the domain of reason, but with three centuries gone 

 all things have changed, save the ready disposition of men of a certain 

 literary bent to cry 'mystery' where there is none, and of all the popular 

 phrases in use to-day, when the weather is up for discussion in the 

 newspapers, none is so abused in the over-using as that which points 

 out that science has 'no reasonable explanation' to offer, and this of 

 phenomena explained in school books! 



Indeed, though the secular newspaper is not otherwise given to 

 an observance of Biblical philosophy, no saying is more devoutly be- 

 lieved, no maxim more rigidly accepted as the guiding principle of 

 journalism in its treatment of the weather, than that of the famous 

 text: 'The wind bloweth where it listeth and thou hearest the sound 

 thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh or whither it goeth.' 



The indifference to weather facts is all the more extraordinary, 

 since the weather is not a casual matter, but one of necessitated daily 

 interest to the public, and, consequently, to the newspaper. That 

 the newspaper recognizes this interest, that it caters to it, that it 

 makes a special effort to meet a taste which it, in fact, partly creates, 

 is shown by the extreme industry evinced in the collection, classification 

 and presentation of storm news; in the constant appearance of the 

 'weather' assignment on the city editor's list, and in a zeal for a weather 

 'spread,' with a pomp of type and details; unfortunately, however, not 

 according to knowledge, and, so far as the public is concerned, too 

 often making 'confusion worse confounded.' 



In view, therefore, of popular interest in the weather, and in view 

 of the great change that has come over the science of the weather in 

 the past twenty-five years, it is as amazing as it is deplorable that such 



