REPORTS BY THE HONORARY SCIENTISTS. 305 
tributed over the country, there being a decided excess in the 
Outer Hebrides, while only half the average fell “over a wide 
district, bounded on the west by a line drawn from Dundee 
through Kingussie to Cromarty.” Bright sunshine was very 
generally below the average, the only place reporting an excess 
being Fort Augustus. Stornoway reported just the average. 
July 1898.—Although the mean temperature was slightly 
under the average, the month was noteworthy as having the 
lowest mean humidity on record, while the rainfall was also 
exceptionally small. The north of the country was relatively 
much colder than the south, but in some districts there was a 
slight excess, amounting to half a degree. The mean rainfall 
was just half the normal, and in many places only one-quarter of 
the average fell, but in Orkney there was a slight excess. Strong 
winds were of rare occurrence, there being only one gale recorded, 
and that in the far north. Bright sunshine was in excess of the 
average, except in the Hebrides. 
August 1898.—The characteristic features of the weather of 
August were a mean temperature a little less than a degree 
above the average, a rainfall 20 per cent. above the average, and 
a normal amount of sunshine. There was an excess of westerly 
winds, due to pressure being relatively higher at southern and 
eastern stations than at places in the north and west. The mean 
temperature was slightly below a degree above the average, the 
excess being greatest in south-western districts open to the 
Atlantic. The excess was more marked near the coast than at 
inland places. The rainfall was distributed over the country 
with great irregularity, being under the average ‘“‘to the east 
of a line drawn from Dunrobin to Fort Augustus, Kingussie, 
Braemar, and Cupar, and in the counties of Berwick, Peebles, 
and Selkirk.” At coast stations on the east there was a great 
deficiency. At all places open to the westerly winds, rainfall 
was above the mean. 
September 1898.—The weather of September was characterised 
by an unusually high mean temperature, with a mean humidity 
slightly under the average, and a rainfall just the normal. The 
mean temperature was 3°:2 above the average, a value exceeded 
only by the Septembers of 1865, 1890, and 1895. The weather 
was eminently anti-cyclonic throughout, and it is to the dry 
atmospheric conditions, clear skies, and strong sunshine character- 
istic of anti-cyclonic conditions, that the high temperature is to 
