THE WEATHER, AND WEATHER PROPHETS. I49 



ought to bring round a periodical increase and diminu- 

 tion in the average rainfalls and barometric heights. 

 Like the others, however, when compared on any ex- 

 tended scale with recorded facts, this results in no 

 establishment of any positive conclusion. 



(10.) A small monthly depression in the average tem- 

 perature arising from the nocturnal radiation consequent 

 on tlie cloudless state of the sky about the full moon, 

 would seem almost a necessary consequence of that 

 phasnomenon. 



(11.) The causes by which that " various and mutable 

 thing" which we call the weather are produced are in 

 themselves few and simple enough ; but the physical 

 laws which determine their actions are numerous and 

 complex ; and the results, in consequence, so mutually 

 interwoven, and the momentary conditions of their ac- 

 tion so dependent on the state of things induced by 

 their previous agency, that it is no wonder it should 

 be next to impossible to trace each specific cause (act- 

 ing as it has done through all past time) direct to its 

 present effect. Yet from this very complexity results 

 that sort of regulated casualty that apparently acci-, 

 dental, yet limited departure and excursion on either 

 side from a monotonous medium that exceeding variety 

 of climate, which renders our globe a fit habitation for 

 such innumerable diversities of incompatible life and 

 that general equilibrium in each v/hich secures to every 

 species, and to each individual of them all, its due share 

 in the distribution of heat, moisture, and wholesome 

 air : considerations, these, which are not lost on those 



