97 
people, in which they have handed down to us the: result of 
centuries of observation by men to whom the coming weather was 
a matter of extreme importance—and in many cases of life or 
death. The weather proverbially is a subject of interest to us 
English ; I only hope you may not find twenty-five years of it rather | 
too large a dose. 
You are, I dare say, familiar with the variety in the distribution 
of rainfall that prevails in Great Britain. The lowest annual aver- 
ages are confined to districts in the south-east and along the eastern 
coasts of England and Scotland. But towards the west, in Ireland, 
and especially wherever there are lofty hills to arrest the winds 
laden with the moisture of the Atlantic, or where there are firths 
like the Solway or the Severn or the Clyde opening up the 
adjacent country to the sea, here we have a much larger quantity 
of rain. Cumberland belongs to the wettest counties, but Carlisle 
itself, you will be glad to know, is situated at the most favourable 
point, and has apparently the least rainfall of any station in the 
county. The average of twenty-five years to 1887 was 30°97 inches; 
whereas further north, at Scaleby, over a similar period, I have 
32°32 inches ; while Mr. Taylor, at Kirkandrews, beats me with an 
avetage of over 38 inches; and at Dumfries you find one exceeding 
40 inches. Again, if you go westward, Wigton and Silloth have 
over 35; while to the south, at Penrith, it is 31°20; at Pillar Top, 
among the hills, it is over 80 ; and lastly, you reach the culminating 
point at Seathwaite, where you have no less than 143 inches in the 
_ year—the highest average in the British isles. 
It is interesting to compare our present rainfall with that of 
_ previous periods which have been recorded. The late Dr. Barnes, 
of Bunker’s Hill, some years ago contributed to the Transactions 
_ of the Royal Society of Edinburgh some notes of such records in 
_ this district, reaching back to the middle of the last century. The 
earliest were those kept by Dr. George Carlyle in Abbey Street 
—who, according to Miss Ferguson’s book, lies buried at St. Cuth- 
 bert’s, and was father of Joseph Dacre Carlyle, Chancellor of 
-Carlisle—from 1757 to 1783, the year before his death, during 
which period the mean average seems to have been only 24°39— 
7 
