66 THE WEATHER OF 1907. 
tion of the annual temperature not being lower than it is. 
While I am on this part of the subject, I may mention that since 
the beginning of August I have been taking observations of the 
minimum temperature on the grass, and with the following re- 
sults: 
Mean of Mean in Lowest in 
month. screen. month. 
August ... si ae ae 44° ae 46°6° = 31° 
September _... die 435 B11 ae 56°3° ae 26° 
October ao ef Ke Bees ake 48°7° is 26° 
November sae sfc ee ale a 42° aM Viz 
December ae : Be lish et oer 39°5° i 20° 
I now proceed to give some account of the rainfall, the 
abundance of which was the special characteristic of the year. 
The amount of precipitation during the year, including rain, 
snow, sleet, and hail, was 43.11 inches, which fell on 218 days. 
—rain on 210 days and snow or sleet on 8. As the average rain- 
fall at Dumfries is about 37 inches, this is fully six inches more 
than the mean, and is expressive of a wet year. It is not, how- 
ever, the rainiest during my period of observation. This distinc- 
tion, if I may call it so, belongs to 1903, when the amount 
recorded was 50.45 inches; and there was one other year which 
had an amount in excess of 1907, viz., 1900, which had 47 
inches, and 1891 and 1897 were only a fraction of an inch short 
of the last year’s record. But all the rest were under that record, 
ranging from 30 to 50 inches. The winter months had quite 
moderate amounts, and so also had the early spring months, 
March and April, but May was a very wet month, with 21 days on 
which it fell, and June had nearly three times its average, with 
27 days on which it fell and a temperature fully 4 degs. below 
the mean. This could not but be very injurious to the growth 
and progress of vegetation, coming at a time when sunshine and 
genial weather are so important to the productions of the farm 
and garden. July was a good month, both in respect of tempera- 
ture and rainfall, but, unfortunately, it was followed by a wet 
August, before almost anything could be done in the harvest 
field; and September was also a good month, the driest of the 
year, with a rainfall of little more than half-an-inch, and only 
five days on which it fell. It had also more sunshine than any 
September for years past. But this advantage was largely 
