44 



not this exemption clue to the fact that the summit is in- 

 suUited? and tliat the electric current seeks a nxn-e favor- 

 able path to the earth? I have noticed repeated dis- 

 charges earthward, over Raymond's Cascade, in tlie Great 

 Gulf in a single shower. 



AQUEOUS PHENOMENA. 



It frequently rains at a temperature of 28° and at times 

 with even a lower reading. It is not uncomnwn for it to 

 snow furiously when the reading is as high as 37.° The 

 warm waves descending to the level of the summit bring 

 rain even in January. Owing to the violence of the 

 wind, measurements of rain and snow are practically use- 

 less. Although the fall of snow is very great, rarely 

 more than two or three feet lie long. The quantity 

 held in suspension during a gale is astonishing. From 

 November to April it is, that of all high Alpine regitms, a 

 dry impalpable powder. A snow-flake mentioned in the 

 Press telegram of January 8th as "new," which was the 

 cause of considerable merriment to a certain class of 

 public journals, may be described as pyramids of six sides 

 base depressed with the sides corresponding to the exte- 

 rior. It seems that Capt. Parry saw this form of snow- 

 flake in one of his voyages and described it in his report. 



Of the frost formations, very beautiful, the highest 

 charm of winter mountain scenery, it is only necessary 

 to remark, that tlie forms are due to certain conditions 

 of the wind, and that it is built U[) by aggregations ot 

 minute specilia of ice, the condi'iisation of vapor at an 

 extremely low temperature. Doubtless electricity plays 

 an important part in the work, as it is only with westerly 

 winds that it forms. 



At a higher temperature than that necessary for the 

 frost formation, ice ujakes on the rocks and surface of the 



