84 ANNUAL RECOKD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



analysis, other substances could he found in sensible amount. 

 He concludes that the powder is undoubtedly of volcanic 

 origin ; and its great resemblance to the powdered pumice- 

 stone found in Iceland points to that island as its origin. In 

 the course of his remarks, alluding to other show^ers of pow- 

 der, Daubree quotes as an instance the ashes from the burn- 

 ing of the city of Chicago, which fell on the Azores the 

 fourth day after the commencement of that catastrophe ; 

 which we allude to here in order that we may state that for 

 weeks before and after the great fire in Chicago in 1872 great 

 areas of forest and prairie land, both in the United States 

 and in the British possessions, were on fire; the smoke and 

 the ashes from which fires w^ere inextricably commingled in 

 the atmosphere with the smoke of Chicago ; and we should 

 deem it in the highest degree improper to say that the ashes 

 of Chicago were landed in the Azores. 6 -S, LXXX., 994. 



faye's theory of storms. 



The Anfiuaire for 18 75, of the Bureau of Longitudes, Paris, 

 contains a memoir by Faye, entitled a defense of the law 

 of storms, in which he seems to advance certain theories 

 of his own in order to defend views lonsj since enun- 

 ciated by Redfield, Piddington, and Reid. The novel views 

 introduced by Faye, and suggested to him first, as he says, 

 by his studies upon the solar phenomena, have been met by 

 some criticisms of Peslin, w^ho states that "the vorticose 

 movement of the air in severe storms, which is needed in the 

 new theory as well as in others that have been broached at 

 different times, allows of a better representation of the direc- 

 tion of the winds at the surface of the earth than is furnish- 

 ed by the circular theories." The constancy with which all 

 storms upon each hemisphere circulate in the same direction 

 is due to the rotation of the earth, according to all other 

 theories, while Faye advances the remarkable explanation 

 that " it results from this, viz., that in strongly curved cur- 

 rents the velocity steadily diminishes as we pass transverse- 

 ly from the concave to the convex side of the current." In 

 regard to the formation of rain in connection with extensive 

 storms, Faye says that " in the air the temperature diminish- 

 es decidedly as we ascend. Now the moisture of the air is 

 susceptible of condensation oftentimes by a very moderate 



