SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, I929 7 



times the amount to make certain I did not hear wrong. Very few natives can 

 speak English so they are more valuable when they have been here a while. 

 They were both very well satisfied when I promised to give them a shilling more 

 for each year they worked here which meant that only one of them did get a 

 raise. 



It has been very cool here recently, the minimum night before last being 4.8° 

 Centigrade, while only about a week ago the maximum was 34.1° Centigrade. 



Under date of December 5, 1929, Mr. Moore writes from the 

 California station : 



Table Mountain has been breaking several records of late, and since today 

 finishes the fourth year of observing here, I'll describe this a little. We have ob- 

 served on 86.0 per cent of the days during the past year, as against approximately 

 T7 per cent the first year, 80 per cent the second, and 83 per cent the third. We 

 got every day in November this year, which month has always lost several days 

 in other years. It was cloudy on December 3, breaking our run of 58 successive 

 days, the second long run this summer, the other being 62 days. Prior to 

 December 3, we had observed on 115 out of 120 successive days. During the 

 summer we encountered more clouds than usual, but the fall has been better than 

 usual, with skies equal to the best Chile skies on a great many days. 



This has been the driest year (from July i) thus far in the history of the 

 Weather Bureau. I saw an article yesterday from San Francisco, which said 

 that their normal rainfall to this date is 4.21 inches, whereas this year they have 

 had 0.0 1 inch. This is quite in keeping with my prediction. It now remains to 

 be seen if this yet proves to be a winter of very heavy precipitation. 



On October 23, Mr. Zodtner, director of the station on Mt. 

 Montezuma, Chile, writes : 



At 5 : 20 a. m. Saturday morning, October 19, we experienced a very violent 

 earthquake. It did a great deal of damage. There was so much dirt and so many 

 rocks shaken down in the tunnel that I had some difficulty in getting the door 

 open. Rocks were broken from the side of the tunnel and dirt and small stones 

 were shaken down through the roof. A part of the pyranometer-galvanometer 

 pier was shaken down. The control magnet was thrown to the floor and the 

 needle system was turned around. The bolometer was moved about one-half a 

 foot and barely escaped being thrown from its pier. The diaphragm on the prism 

 face was shaken from the prism. In fact, the prism itself was dislocated but is 

 all right. The clock pendulum was hit with stones but is O. K. The pyrheliom- 

 eters were not touched in any way as I always keep them under a double cover 

 and on the floor which protected them from rocks and dirt falling from the roof. 



The sight of all this was almost too discouraging. To make matters worse, 

 it was cloudy and the weather has been poor since. Saturday we cleaned out the 

 tunnel. Checked the slit and found that it was all right. Next, set the prism at 

 minimum deviation and checked it with the transit for verticularity. After this, 

 we reset the diaphragm on the prism and got the magnet facing west. Then 

 tried to focus the bolometer but with poor success because of sky condition. 

 Sunday, we set up the pyranometer-galvanometer which is functioning very 

 well now. Then reset the pendulum after cleaning it. We then tried again 



