IV. 



KErORT OX TEE RAINFALL IX HERTFORDSHIRE IX 1891. 



By John Hopkinsox, F.L.S., F.G.S., F.R.Met.Soc, President. 



Head at Watford, 18th March, 1892. 



The number of our rainfall observers in the year 1891 shows a 

 considerable increase upon that of any previous year, and this 

 increase necessitates a re -arrangement of our principal table. For 

 some years the number of stations for which the records have been 

 inserted in this table has been 30 : the number to be inserted now 

 is 36; the number of gauges is 38; and the number of daily records 

 received is 25, an increase of one upon that for the previous year. 



The records for Nash Mills and Gorhambury now take their 

 former place in the principal table, from which they had to be 

 omitted in last year's report ; the record for Bedford Road, Hitchin, 

 now first appears in it ; that for a station from which the returns 

 have lately been intermittent — Bushey Heath — is again included ; 

 and there are two stations added from which returns have not 

 before been received — Aldenham House, Elstree, and Hamels Park, 

 Buntingford. 



These alterations increase the number of returns for the river- 

 districts of the Hiz, the Gade, the Lower Colne, and the Rib from 

 two to three, and for the river-district of the Ver from three to 

 four, and add to our table a new district, the Upper Colne, thus 

 reducing the number of districts without observers from five to 

 four : namely the Upper Ivel in the north, the Chess in the south- 

 west, the Brent in the south, and the Stort in the east. Of these 

 the Chess and the Stort are the districts in which it is most im- 

 portant that we should have observers. 



The only other alteration is that Mr. Marlborough Pryor's gauge, 

 foiTuerly at Weston Manor, has been moved to Weston Park, a 

 distance of about half a mile. 



Particulars of the 36 rainfall stations, and the monthly and total 

 rainfall and number of days on which at least 0*0 1 inch of rain fell, 

 are given in Tables I and II, pp. 55-57. 



A supplementary table (Table III, p. 58) gives ten other records 

 of the total rainfall in the year. Two of these are the records of 

 the additional gauges at Rothamsted which make up our number 

 to 38, and eight are taken from 'British Rainfall, 1891.' 



The symbols in the last column of Table I, as in previous 

 reports, show the method by which the height of each gauge has 

 been determined, /j\ signifying that a series of levels has been taken 

 to the gauge from the nearest bench-mark, T that the height has 

 been ascertained approximately from the same source, L that levels 

 have been taken to the gauge from some datum other than Ortlnance 

 mean sea-level, and B that the height has been taken by means of 

 the barometer. 



The moan rainfall in the county in the year 1891 was 29-62 

 inches. This is 2 88 inches above the mean for the 10 years 



VOL. VII. — PART II. 5 



