52 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



storms, and the direction and intensity of the wind, (which can be 

 done without instruments,) will render valuable service in advancing 

 a knowledge of the laws of the atmospheric disturbances to which 

 we are constantly subjected^ and which exercise so important an in- 

 fluence on our health, comfort, and occupation. To induce persons to 

 furnish this simple but valuable information a blank form has been 

 prepared for more general distribution than the one required by those 

 who are provided with instruments. If sufficient data of this kind 

 could be obtained to complete a series of maps, comprising one for 

 each day in a single year, over the whole United States, the laws of 

 the general phenomena of our storms could be determined. For this 

 purpose observations are j^articularly desirable from regions west of 

 the Mississippi river, and every traveller over the plains would render 

 important service by making a record of the weather at least three 

 times a day, viz: at 7 a. m., 2 and 9 p. m., and transmitting a copy 

 to the Commissioner of Patents. The principles which have been 

 already determined in regard to the development and progress of 

 storms fully demonstrate the importance of the information to be de- 

 rived from daily telegraphic despatches as regards probable changes 

 of weather in the eastern portions of the United States. The Institu- 

 tion and the public generally are indebted to the Morse telegraph line 

 for the gratuitous reports which its operators have daily furnished. 



An object of much interest at the Smithsonian building is a daily 

 exhibition on a large map of the condition of the weather over a con- 

 siderable portion of the United States. The reports are received about 

 ten o'clock in the morning, and the changes on the maps are made by 

 temporarily attaching to the several stations pieces of card of differ- 

 ent colors to denote different conditions of the weather as to clearness, 

 cloudiness, rain or snow. This map is not only of interest to visitors 

 in exhibiting the kind of weather which their friends at a distance are 

 experiencing, but is also of importance in determining at a glance the 

 probable changes which may soon be expected. It is to be hoped that 

 reports may hereafter be received from all parts of the country to 

 which telegraphic lines extend. The value of the information thus 

 received would be much enhanced if a brief record of the direction of 

 the wind and the indications of the thermometer were in all cases added. 



At the last meeting of the American Association for the Advancement 

 of Science a committee was appointed, on motion of Major Lachlan, of 

 Cincinnati, to petition the several States of the Union and the govern- 

 ments of other portions of the continent to co-operate with the Smith- 



