342 
ence can be safely drawn from them which will endure the test of 
critical examination. Any small selection of years may be made 
which will seem to support some suggested relation between tempera- 
ture, rainfall, and crop, but other years will be found to contradict this. 
In a general way good crops result from hot and dry summers and 
bad harvests depend upon the large rainfalls rather than on the low 
temperatures. I have added the column of departures and have com- 
puted the probable errors of the averages, the study of which shows 
that the temperatures of the good harvest seasons are not sufficiently 
above those of the poor harvest seasons to justify the conclusion that 
warm seasons are intimately connected with good harvests. If, how- 
ever, we go into more detail and examine all of the fifty-three years 
from 1816 to 1888, inclusive, and arrange them by the character of 
the harvests, we find innumerable contradictions. The study of the 
rainfall with its probable errors, or rather its probable variability, 
shows a somewhat stronger argument in favor of the idea that large 
rainfalls accompany poor harvests, and yet here again the contradic- 
tions are too numerous to allow us to suppose that this simple state- 
ment expresses exactly any law of nature. Thus the largest rainfall 
of 1888 and the small rainfall of 1886 both contradict this law. Tn 
the notes a few statements are made by the author as to special occur- 
rences which seem to him to explain these anomalous cases, and by 
hunting through the records a few more notes might have been added 
so that after leaving out the anomalous cases one might say that the 
remainder accords well with the idea that dry hot summers give large 
crops and that heavy rains give poor crops. In general, however, it 
seems more proper to conclude that we are far from having attained 
the expression or formula connecting the crops and the weather, and 
that even if we knew this it would be improper to study the crops 
of England with reference to the temperature and rainfall at Green- 
wich, or, indeed, any other single station. 
English wheat harvests and Greenwich weather, 
[ Weather in June, July, and August. ] 
I. SUPERIOR WHEAT HARVESTS. 
Temperature. Rainfall. 
Year. Character of harvest. 
eal Dep. Pf Dep. 
He Oya Inches. 
Ciba Pelentitule: 25 ton Nes Ak ee eee SR ee 62.0 +0,8 (rte | Sasohes Se 
ay (ft) ee Gone 52 ieee ie Peas BE SLC ere een aa eee 62.3 +1.1 (Goya bees 5 ere 
1791) Abundant. %.. 25 ea8 oS) Mesa ees be eee ee 59.5 Sd fil > Dry. | Reet eee 
I8l8|sMostiabundant 22256. 2 sae. eee seme Sean omer 64.3 +3.1 1.4 —4,3 
ASTO Mine! Oe BOR ATA UNE eat IER ORG) ASD aNe rads 60.3 —1.9 4.6 —1.1 
18203) MProauactivel se ee see e ee Pete ry Ob Sale Aine ee ee Se 58.0 —3.2 8.2 +2.5 
18250)| Hamlyian as 2OO ds seme ee see ae be see ee es 62.0 +0.8 3.3 —2.4 
1826 | Remarkably early and very great.____-_--____---- 64.0 +2.8 | 5.1 —0.6 
82 tl"Goode than eee Sek AE ae ee ees Eee ea 60.0 —1.2 2.9 —2.8 
