158 



PROCEEDINGS OF THE COTTESWOLD CLUB 



from the sky to the earth." In my own return it will be 

 found that the monthly returns have varied as follows : — 



Jan from 69 to 476 I July from 0*30 to 5' 10 



Showing an average range of as much as from i to 10, 

 and considerably more in individual months. July, for 

 instance, "30 to 5'I0, or as i to 17; while the yearly 

 returns have only varied from 20 inches to 36 inches, or 

 as from i to i^. 



It will be noted, also, that February is the driest month 

 of the year, and that the last six months of the year 

 average i6"07 inches, as against ii'9i for the first six; 

 hence, when February has any heavy fall of rain its effect 

 following on the six wetter months, at a time when 

 evaporation and vegetation are at their lowest, is so 

 apparent in the larger amount of rain finding its way into 

 watercourses as to have given rise to its " fill-dyke " name. 



Another fact not perhaps recognised, and which can 

 only be shown by daily returns, is that a fall of one inch 

 in 24 hours is not by any means common even to every 

 year. The last which I had was on 12th November, 1894, 

 and there were none in 1892-3, so that four years out of 

 14 did not have any fall of one inch ; in the other 10 years 

 the falls of one inch were rather more than two for each 

 year. A rainfall of three inches in two days has only 

 once fallen within my experience, and the result of this, 

 in the consequent flooding of the road between Gloucester 

 and Birdlip, and the lower parts of Gloucester at the Spa, 

 Wagon Works, &c., is such as to make one thankful that 

 in our temperate climate we have not to contend with the 



