812 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



trative reports regarding organization and oi)erations (during the year ended 

 March 31, 1911) in marine meteorology, forecasts and storm warnings, climatol- 

 ogy, publications, investigation of the upper air, and miscellaneous subjects, 

 with appendixes as follows: Financial statement, supply of information to the 

 public, lists of observers who sent in " excellent " meteorological logs during 

 the year and of logs and documents rcK-eived from ships, distribution of instru- 

 ments, rei)ort on insi)ection of meteorological stations, and lists of persons and 

 institutions from whom publications and meteorological data have been re- 

 ceived and to whom publications are sent. 



Variations in the English climate during the thirty years 1881-1910, 

 W. Marriott (Quart. Jour. Roy. Met. Soc. [London], 37 {1911), No. 159, pp. 

 221-242, figs. S; rev. in Surveyor, J/O (1911), No. 1027, pp. 359-361).— Th\s 

 article contains a set of tables based upon means of temperature, pressure, 

 rainfall, and wind for the British Isles, and gives data bearing upon variations 

 in mean monthly temperatures, recurring warm and cold months in successive 

 years, hot and warm spells, recurring wet and dry months in successive years, 

 and dry and wet spells. 



British rainfall, 1910, H. R. Mill (London, 1911, pp. 112+328, pis. 6, figs. 

 67). — This report deals as usual with the amount and distribution of rainfall 

 in the British Isles during 1910, as recorded by nearly 5,000 voluntary ob- 

 servers belonging to the British Rainfall Organization. 



It contains a report of the director giving a detailed account of the year's 

 work, and special articles on the greatest rainfall which may occur on the 

 wettest day of the year, the rearrangement of the rainfall stations, and the rain 

 gage in theory and practice. There are also records of evaporation and per- 

 colation at Camden Square, London, and several other places. 



A new feature of this report to which special attention is called is the 

 rearrangement of the stations in river basins, the county being retained as the 

 unit. The cartographic treatment of rainfall data has also been carried further 

 than in previous volumes and a new rainfall average has been introduced. 



The average rainfall for the British Isles in 1910 was 41.77 in. as compared 

 with a ten year average, 1900 to 1909, of 38.39 in., and a thirty-five year average, 

 1875 to 1909, of 38.49 in. The mean evaporation at 11 stations was 16.37 in. 

 The percolation at 3 stations from which records were secured varied from 50 

 to 62 per cent of the rainfall. 



The nitrogen compounds in rain and snow, F. T. Shutt (Proc. and Trans. 

 Roy. Soc. Canada, 3. ser., J, (1910), Sect. Ill, pp. 55-59). — This article is based 

 on data noted elsewhere (E. S. R., 24, p. 417). 



On the absorption of ammonia from the atmosphere, A. D. Hall and 

 N. H. J. Miller (Jour. Ayr. Set., Jf (1911), No. 1, pp. 56-68; abs. in Jour. Chem. 

 Soc. [London-], 100 (1911), No. 586, II, pp. 763, 764). —Monthly determinations 

 during two years of the amounts of atmospheric ammonia absorbed by dilute 

 sulphuric acid in dishes 26.5 cm. in diameter are reported. 



" The highest results were obtained with dishes kept at a height of about 115 

 cm. above the ground in front of the Rothamsted laboratory, near the outside 

 of the town, the nitrogen absoi'bed amounting to 1.48 lbs. per acre per annum. 

 In dishes in the same situation, but only 5 cm. above the ground, the amount 

 absorbed was only 0.85 lb. 



" Dishes placed in the experimental grass plats showed somewhat higher 

 results in the upper dish (0.78 lb.) than in the lower one (0.70 lb.). In the 

 experimental wheat field the absorption in the upper dishes was 1.14 lbs., and 

 in the lower dishes 1.53 lbs. The higher results obtained in the wheat field as 

 compared with the grass plats are mainly due to considerable amounts of 



