3o6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



put upon the weather-charts of the past. How much more light will 

 they derive from the new international " sinmltaneoiis " weather-maps ! 

 While the scientific world is despairing of finding adequate mechanical 

 means of mooring a floating weather-station in mid- Atlantic to cable 

 its reports to land, the necessity for such a station is being gradually 

 superseded by the development of researches which if studied will 

 supply adequate rules for weather-forecasting without mid- Atlantic 

 reports. The immediate value of every means which offers any approxi- 

 mation to correct storm-warnings for the British and French coasts — 

 frequented by the navies and merchant marines of every flag — is be- 

 yond calculation in dollars and cents. 



The ultimate value of the temperature and rainfall statistics ob- 

 tained by this research, especially in their application to agriculture, 

 can not be questioned. Even if such data were of no avail for the 

 general work of weather-forecasting, they reach into the sj^here of all 

 farming operations, and are utilized by all classes. One of the most 

 striking exemplifications of this fact has been furnished by Governor 

 Rawson, of the island of Barbadoes, who, in an ofticial paper, has used 

 the rainfall reports " in calculating the probability, or expectation, of 

 coming seasons as respects the yield of the sugar-plantations." 



The long-protracted and often torrential precipitation that drenched 

 the British Islands and large portions of western Europe last summer 

 (1879), had been preceded by long-protracted and abnormal chilling of 

 those countries, whose crops were blighted or dwarfed for want of sun- 

 shine and ruined by too frequent down-pours. Now, it is a fact worthy 

 of deep reflection that on June 12th, before this dreary and desolating 

 summer had set in, the English journal of science, " Nature," published 

 a summary of thermometric data from ninety-two stations, which 

 demonstrated that " the cold weather, for the six months ending May 

 1, 1879, exceeded in intensity" (that of) " any other past period of cold 

 weather in these islands of like duration, of which we have an exact 

 and authentic record." Great Britain on the 1st of May was then 

 abnormally refrigerated ; these islands, and we may add the adjacent 

 continent, were ready to act as powerful condensers of the tropical 

 and North Atlantic vapor wafted over them in enormous volumes by 

 the southwest or "anti-trade" winds, which especially prevailed in 

 summer. But more significant still were the barometric conditions 

 prevailing over Iceland, which so greatly affected the weather of the 

 British Isles. The spring of 1879 was unusually co?(7, and the interna- 

 tional weather-charts, prepared by our Signal-Service, show unusually 

 high pressures throughout April, 1879, over Iceland, just as occurred 

 in July, 1867, when there was a memorably cold spell in Great Britain 

 — owing to the fact, as Mr. Buchan explains it, that "the pressure 

 being low in Norway and countries surrounding the Baltic, and hic/h 

 in Iceland, Scotland was thus placed in the cold Arctic current which 

 set in from Iceland toward the Baltic." 



