TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 21 
~ July 5.—Extraordinary oscillation of the sea in Penzance*, Plymouth, Scotland, 
&c., and a great thunderstorm+ throughout the island. Barometer at Penzance at 
the time of the oscillation there 29°50, lower than for twenty-five days before and 
forty-seven days after. Thermometer at Chiswick.88°, at Brighton 78°, the maxima 
for the year at those places. 
October 30.—Similar oscillations of the sea at Penzance and Plymouth}. Ba- 
rometer at Penzance at the time of the oscillation 29°00, which, except the minimum 
of the 27th, was lower than for 223 days before and 115 days after. 
1844, February 26.—Barometer at Chiswick 28624, lower than for 409 days be- 
fore and ever since. At Penzance it was 28°50, having fallen nearly two inches in 
thirty-six hours. 
June 23.—An unusually severe and protracted thunderstorm this evening through- 
out Cornwall and in Dumfries-shire, and on the following morning at Boston and 
Liverpool, at which latter place ‘‘ pebbles and small eels descended in the streets §.”” 
Thermometer at Chiswick on the 23rd, 91°; highest for the year except one day in 
July. In the weekly meteorological report from the Greenwich Observatory, it is 
stated as an extraordinary fact, that “at 1 o’clock p.m. (of the 23rd) a thermometer 
placed on a small piece of raw wool in the sun’s rays, rose in seven minutes to 155°, 
and was still rising when the thermometer was taken away.” 
October 18.—The town of Buffalo on Lake Erie almost destroyed by a hurricane. 
This was the day of the moon’s first quarter, and almost exactly twenty-four luna- 
tions after the earthquake in that neighbourhood already mentioned. At Chiswick 
this day the maximum of the thermometer was less by 3° than for several months 
before, and the barometer on the 16th was at a minimum of 28°940, lower than since 
the 26th of February. 
1845, February 12.—The greatest cold experienced in England probably during 
the present century. Thermometer at Blackheath, at half past 7 a.m., 334° below 
the freezing-point ; at Chiswick 35° below that point. Barometer at the latter place 
30°409, higher than for nine months before, except on the 21st of December. 
June 13.—Extraordinary oscillation of the sea in Kent||, and a “terrific” thun- 
derstorm at Chatham. The temperature very high in all parts of England; ther- 
mometer at Penzance being 77°, higher than on any other day of the year hitherto]. 
Not one of the phenomena for which the above nine days are remarkable, was 
forty-eight hours from the moon’s first change or quarter. Three of the days 
were each at the moon’s first quarter nearest the solstice ; of these the first and last 
were distinguished for extraordinary oscillations of the sea, while all were remark- 
able for great thunderstorms and unusually warm weather**. 
The author’s attention was drawn to the interval of four lunations by having re- 
marked++ that interval, or 118 days, between the two oscillations of the sea, at and 
* The author, who witnessed this oscillation in Mounts-bay, has given a minute desctiption 
of it in the Transactions of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall, 1843, p. 114, and con- 
siders that such phenomena result from submarine shocks or vibrations of the earth, which, 
after being transmitted through the sea, more rapidly than sound through air, exhaust them- 
selves on reaching the shore, in a succession of long waves or tide-like oscillations. See also 
Jameson's Edinburgh Philosophical Journal for April 1845, pp. 271-279. 
+ Mr. Milne has described this storm and the oscillations of the sea observed in different 
parts of Great Britain, in the Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, vol. xv. 
pp. 609-638. 
+ Transactions of the Geological Society of Cornwall, 1843, p. 120. 
§ Literary Gazette, p. 420. 
|| This was observed at Folkstone at 4 P.m., and is thus described in the newspapers :— 
“The tide then flowing changed to ebbing three different and continuous times, causing 
much agitation of the sea at the harbour’s mouth. This had been preceded by a heavy and 
brief whirlwind from the S.E. The rise of the water appeared to be about three feet, and 
its sudden receding produced the agitation.” 
4 Higher than on any other day of the year except the 9th and 10th of September, 
exactly three lunations afterwards, when it was 77° and 78°. 
** So also in 1842, the hottest day of the hottest June in Boston in Lincolnshire since 
1826, was the 14th, the day before the moon’s first quarter, the thermometer at Chiswick 
_ being then 88°, the same as on the 5th July 1843. 
+f Transactions of Geological Society of Cornwall, 1843, p. 120. 
