472 METEOROLOGY. 



CLIMATE OF KANSAS. 



By R. S. Elliott, 

 Industrial agent Kansas Pacific Eailway. 



Pond Creek Station, Kansas Pacific Eailway, 



Septemhcr U2, 1870. 



I have been ou the Plains nearly all the time from early in ]\Iay till this 

 date. There has been much dry weather, bat I have not seen one cloud- 

 less day ; no day on which the sun would rise clear and roll along a canopy 

 of brass to the west. There has always been humidity enough to form 

 clouds at the proper height, and on many days they would be seen 

 defining, by thin flat bottoms, the exact line where the condensation 

 became sufficient to render the vapor visible. The sun would be only 

 partially obscured at intervals, the condensation not being of a character 

 materially to lessen the effect of his rays in giving us heat and light, 

 until in the after part of the day, when appearances of a storm were apt 

 to jjresent themselves in some part of the heavens ; only, however, too 

 often to pass away without giving us the desired shower. 



I conclude from all this that abundant moisture has floated over the 

 Plains to have given us a great deal more rain than would be desirable 

 if it had been precipitated. 



Sometimes a storm would be seen to gather near the horizon, and we 

 could see the rain pending from the clouds like a fringe, hanging appar- 

 ently in mid-air, unable to reach the expectant earth. The rain stage 

 of condensation had been reached above, but the descending shower 

 was revaporized apparentlj', and thus arrested. 



In a moderately calm day — for our calms are only moderate in this 

 airy region — I have observed little columns of dust to arise in all direc- 

 tions, generally widely scattered. These usnally, if not always, coin- 

 cided Vv'ith mirage in all directions ; not that they appeared in the 

 mirage, but coincided in the day of their appearance. The mirage, 

 however, very often appeared on days too windy for the little columns 

 to be formed ; they being only whirlwinds rendered visible by the dust 

 taken up. Within forty-eight hours after the little column i^henomena, 

 I have noted that the wind is apt to be coming strongly from the north- 

 ward, laden with a mist or scud that sometimes reaches the dignity of 

 rain. 



The changes of wind are often very sudden, from southward — the 

 prevailing point in summer — to all points, but mainly to the north. 

 Sometimes this change is observed during the progress of a rain-storm, 

 and seems to be due to a sort of local or limited cyclone; but the differ- 

 ence in temperature between the south and north winds seems to forbid 

 the cyclone theory. I cannot understand how a circuit of a few hun- 

 dred miles in the heated prairie sh.ould so cool a current that had only 



