214 On a remarkable Flood at Chipping in Lancashire. 



gauge exposed in the garden became choked with sand; not, 

 however, until it had collected rain to the depth of 2*2 inches 

 during that single shower. The hour at which the flood passed 

 through Chipping was, as far as I could ascertain, about 4^ p.m. 

 From the account which has been given, it appears that the 

 ovei-flowing of Chipping brook was mainly attributable to the 

 sudden discharge of a large volume of water on the side of Par- 

 lick ; that this discharge must have partaken somewhat of the 

 nature of a water-spout, and must have consisted of several 

 distinct discharges, all contained within the space of about 150 

 yards measured in a horizontal line along the side of the hill. 

 Besides this, rain must have fallen with extraordinary fury along 

 the whole extent of hills, as appears from the degree to which 

 the ordinary sources of Chipping brook were swollen, as also the 

 other brooks which take their rise in the same range of hills*. 

 Leagram brook, which descends from the same range but more 

 to the eastward, was also flooded, but not to such a degree as to 

 be worthy of any very special notice. Graystoneley brook, which 

 rises among the same hills but still further to the east, rose sud- 

 denly, as I was assured, to the depth of a yard. Still, a farmer 

 who saw it about an hour and a half afterwards, told me there 

 was no flood, and that the water was merely muddied. I do not 

 look upon these accounts as altogether contradictory, since all 

 agree that the subsidence of the waters was as rapid as their 

 rise. Still the Hodder was not even coloured above the con- 

 fluence of these brooks, showing that at Whitewell there was no 

 rain of any consequence, but that the watershed of the Gray- 

 stoneley brook was the extreme eastern limit of the storm; 

 whereas the Loud, which rises on the western side of Parlick, 

 was a great flood even before it received the waters of the Chip- 

 ping and Leagram brooks. So great an efi^ect had the water of 

 the Loud upon the Hodder, that even at Lower Hodder Bridge, 

 where the river flows near Stonyhurst, the muddy waters came 



* Some persons who were on the top of Parlick at the time describe the 

 rain as havine fallen in streams or sheets of water, and affirm that they ex- 

 perienced difficulty in breathing whilst exposed to it. A gentleman who 

 was exposed to it in Chipping, told me that he experienced the sensation 

 of warmth as it fell upon his person, although the day was sultry, and he 

 was heated with walking at the time. 



I have been able to discover no traces of marine deposits, which would 

 probably have been found if the water had been raised up in a body from 

 the sea, as is the case in a water-spout. I am inclined to look upon the 

 discharges as produced by the sudden condensation of a cloud loaded with 

 an enormous amount of vapour, accumulated doubtless during the previous 

 extremely hot weather, and thus poured down in a volume on the side of 

 the hill -.the fact of several discharges having taken place so near to each 

 other is not so easy to explain. 



