42 KANSAS ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 



which is a general characteristic of the climate and makes the high 

 temperature of midsummer comparatively easy to endure. The 

 greater the amount of moisture in the air, the more oppressive be- 

 comes the heat, so that eighty degrees in Philadelphia is more in- 

 tolerable than ninety degrees in Lawrence. 



THE WINTER SEASON. 



The winters of Kansas are generally open, the fall of snow being 

 comparatively light, rarely exceeding six inches in depth for a single 

 storm. The average annual depth of snow for the five years ob- 

 served was 21^ inches, the least amount being 9^ inches in 1870, 

 and the greatest 29^4 inches in 1871. 



There is great variation in the severity of our winter months. In 

 1869 the mercury sank below zero on but two days, the lowest point 

 being only five degrees below zero, while in 1872 the zero point was 

 passed on sixteen days, the lowest point being eighteen degrees be- 

 low zero, and the mercury being below zero during some portion of 

 the twenty-four hours on eight successive days (Dec. 20th to 27th). 



There is also great variation in the duration of the winter seasons. 

 In the winter of 1867-68, farmers were plowing during the whole of 

 December and until the fifth day of January, on which date winter 

 properly began. Uninterrupted cold weather then continued until 

 the twelfth of February, when the winter was at an end after an ex- 

 istence of 38 days. Farmers were plowing again on the fifteenth 

 of February, and there were only five days thereafter (four in Feb- 

 ruary and one in March,) on which the mean temperature fell below 

 the freezing point. The winter of 1871-72, on the other hand, was 

 nearly three months in length, extending from the eighteenth of 

 November to the fifteenth of February. The Kansas river was 

 closed at Lawrence on the twenty-seventh of November and was 

 not opened until the twenty-third of February, a period of 88 days. 



KANSAS TEMPERATURE COMPARED WITH THAT OF OTHER STATES. 



As furnishing the means of comparing the mean temperatures of 

 Kansas with those of other States, the following table is introduced, 

 which, together with a similar table concerning the rainfall, was pre- 

 pared by the writer for Mr. C. C. Hutchinson's " Resources of Kan- 

 sas." These tables were compiled from the observations of the four 

 hundred meteorological observers of the Smithsonian Institution, of 

 whom nearly twenty are located in different parts of Eastern Kan- 

 sas, including Atchison on the north, Baxter Springs on the south, 

 Leavenworth and Olathe on the east, and Manhattan on the west. 

 Only twenty States are represented in this comparison, those States 

 engaged in the rebellion being omitted because the returns from 

 them for the years 1865, '66 and '67 are too meagre to afford trust- 

 worthy results : 



