METEOROLOGICAT. WORK IN AUSTRALIA. 



249 



Alice Springs, in the centre of the continent, during the years 

 1890, 1891, and 1892. 



* Twenty-seven days. 



Greatest in One year at Adelaide 60-953 inches in 1876. 



Least in one year at Adelaide 47-392 inches in 1892. 



Average rainfall at Adelaide for fifty-four years 21-077 inches. 



Average rainfall at Alice Springs for nineteen years . . 11-254 inches. 



In Tasmania the Imperial Government established a magnetic 

 .and meteorological ol servatory at Hobart. as part of an inter- 

 national scheme, in charge of Captain Kay, and systematic meteoro- 

 logical observations were conducted i'rom 1841 to 1854, hourly 

 readings bemg taken until the end of 1848. The results were 

 published, together with the magnetic observations, in four large 

 quarto volumes with a short but interesting and instructive 

 article by the late Professor Dove, then director of the meteoro- 

 logical stations in Prussia. Similar observatories were established 

 at Greenwich, St. Helena, Cape of Good Hope, and Toronto, 

 besides places in Europe, and by Russia in Asia. 



From the beginning of 1855, the Imperial Observatory being 

 closed, meteorological observati'ins at Hobart were carried on by 

 the late Mr. Francis Abbott imtil about the year 1880, when the 

 Government took up the work, Avhich was entrusted to the late 

 Captain Shortt, R.N., who died last year. Captain Shortt proved 

 a valuable coadjutor, and established eight other observing stationf 

 besides a number of rain gauges in various parts of the island, os 

 which there are now about fifty-nine. 



