ELIAS LOOMIS. 829 



teorology." These were at first based upon the publications of the 

 Signal Service alone ; but, as years went by, like publications appeared 

 in Europe that were useful for his work. These papers weie pub- 

 lished in July and January following the Academy meeting, and they 

 regularly formed the first and leading article in eighteen successive 

 volumes of the *' American Journal of Science." Gradually, one 

 after another of his college duties was committed to others, that he 

 might give his whole strength to these investigations. In 1884 he 

 began a revision of the whole series of papers. They had been pre- 

 sented without much regard to systematic order in the subjects inves- 

 tigated, and new material had accumulated from time to time, so that 

 a thorough systematic revision seemed absolutely necessary. 



In 1885 he presented to the National Academy of Sciences the first 

 chapter of this revision, in which he discussed the areas of low press- 

 ure, their form, their size, their motions, and the phenomena attending 

 them. Two years later, in 1887, the second chapter of the revision 

 appeared, in which he discussed the areas of high pressure, their form, 

 magnitude, direction, and velocity of movement, and their relation to 

 areas of low pressure. Gradually his physical strength was failing, 

 though his mind was bright and clear as ever. To this work — the 

 only w'ork which he was now doing — he was able to give two or 

 three hours a day. Anxiously he husbanded his strength, slowly and 

 ])ainfully preparing the diagrams and the tables for the third chapter 

 upon rain areas, the phenomena of rainfall in its connection with areas 

 of low pressure, and the varied phenomena of unusual rainfall. " I 

 see," he said to a friend, " not the end of this subject, but where I 

 must stop. I hope I shall have strength to finish this work, and then 

 I shall be ready to die." 



This third and finishing chapter was finally passed through the 

 printer's hands, and some advance copies distributed to correspondents 

 abroad, in the summer months of 1889. His work upon the theory of 

 storms he felt was finished. Before the close of the vacation he died. 



These three chapters of his revised edition of " Contributions to 

 Meteorology " constitute the full and ripe fruitage of his work in his 

 favorite science. They will for a long time to come be the basis 

 of facts by which writers in theoretical meteorology must test their 

 formulas. They cover all the important points taken up in the 

 twenty-three earlier memoirs, with one important exception, the rela- 

 tion of mountain observations to those made on the plains below. 



Professor Loomis became interested in the subject of genealogy 

 early in life, and that interest remained unbroken to his last days. 



