316 Mr. Redfield’s Reply to Dr. Hare. 
of wind, squall, tornado, or other storm, ever constitutes an essen= 
tial feature of the same: but, the part so performed, appears to me 
to be only incidental and subordinate to the action and main ef- 
fects of the storm. Electricity is not wind, nor water, nor vapor; 
but an imponderable matter or effect, which is not known to ex- 
ert any constant mechanical force or action upon the effective 
currents of the atmosphere. “Thunder and lightning and con- 
vective discharge,” are but momentary or transient exhibitions of 
electricity, producing no visible effects upon these currents; what- 
ever may be their agency in restoring the disturbed equilibrium 
of the different atmospheric elements. The electricity developed 
by a steam boiler is not considered as producing the steam or its 
jet, or the condensation of the latter; but is itself produced by 
these. Even were it shown that a stream of electricity was con- 
stantly developed between the rarefied column of a moving tor- 
nado and the surface beneath, I cannot see how this could be as- 
sumed as the cause rather than the effect of the local rarefaction. 
If the part which electricity performs in a storm be essential, or 
controlling, its functions ought to be distinctly pointed ont. 
I would humbly suggest that the old practice of forming or in- 
venting theories or schemes of action for the powers of nature, 
ought to be mainly abandoned. The Wernerian and Huttonian 
theories are well remembered; and how small would have been 
the progress of the science to which they relate, had its cultiva- 
tors. continued to exhibit only the spirit and philosophy of the 
early advocates of these theories; and how much less, if guided 
by a philosophy so speculative and untenable as that of the affiu-- 
ent and up-moving hypotheses of winds and storms? More strict 
and extended. observations and inquiry, with greater caution in 
the adoption of hypotheses, whether old or new, would in my 
meet, tend greatly to the advance of meteorological science. 
» Observation, rather than “lucubration,”’ has been my employ- 
ment when manengtie from other duties: and if the results of ob- 
do not accord with the “lucubrations” of Mr. Espy and 
Dr. Hare, I conceive that Iam in no degree responsible for the 
difficulties of their position. 
Now-York, Januagy, 13,1842... 
ob Mae rntareiey 2 
