170 THE TORNADO OF 1851. 



cannot all be true. It is not a question of more or less, — of generalities and details, — 

 but of black and white. If some of these theories be establislied as true, the others 

 are necessarily false ; and in a matter which may be made of so much practical im- 

 portance, we cannot too soon ascertain on which side the preponderance of truth is to be 

 found. 



Every science is elaborated by a slow and gradual progress from its simplest elements. 

 A stone falls, as stones have always fallen, and from reasoning which happens to be, by 

 one mind, directed to this every-day incident, is elaborated, only after patient study and 

 research, our present law of gravitation. So, in all sciences, the most common events, 

 which are presenting themselves every day before our eyes, but without exciting our 

 attention, do finally, when reason is properly directed to them, furnish the material — 

 rude, rough, unshapen, it may be at first — which shall, when properly elaborated, form 

 the solid and enduring structure of the true science. In Meteorology the work is hardly 

 begun. Storms, of more or less violence, are constantly occurring, but they come w ith- 

 out warning, and leave behind them evidences, not only of their own desolating powder, 

 but of man's ignorance, which prevented him from anticipating and guarding against 

 them. How many millions of dollars, and how many valuable lives, would be annually 

 saved, if we had that precise knowledge which could tell us with the voice of recognized 

 authority that the storm is approaching, and that the ship which we are so joyfully 

 cheering on her way is doomed to destruction if she leave the port ! Nay, more, we 

 may deny even the possibility of prediction, and assume merely a knowledge of the 

 mode and sphere of action of storms, and even this shall enable the mariner to direct 

 his course with judgment, and escape their fury, instead of running, under false theories, 

 into the very vortex of ruin. If the storm be not a solitary exception to those general 

 laws which govern our physical world, — laws whose beauty, harmony, universality, and 

 mutual dependence, science is every day more and more demonstrating, — then it is not 

 unreasonable to suppose that the time will come when its laws shall be so far made 

 known, that the wayfarer on the mighty deep shall be able to escape from the approach- 

 in'^ hurricane, with the same certainty and decision with which we now move out of the 

 track of the rushing locomotive engine. 



To those who have lived where the hurricane or the tornado is an event of common 

 occurrence, it would be impossible to convey any idea of the intense excitement caused 

 in this community by the tornado of August 22, 1851. It swept through the towns 

 of Waltham, West Cambridge, and Medford, prostrating in its path orchards, fences, 

 forest-trees, and buildings, and involving in a few instances the loss of human life. 

 "While multitudes visited the scene of its ravages from mere motives of curiosity, and 



