Ixxii. PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. 



the average over the whole of the British Isles, the excess 

 amounting in the Midlands and East of England to 2, in 

 spite of the fact that the summer was cool and sunless. The 

 summer was also dry, and in most parts the amount of rain 

 for the year was below the average, Ireland, however, having 

 an excess of 5 per cent. The same statement also applies 

 to the rainfall of the past winter. At the British Association 

 Meeting the subject of the comparative departures from the 

 normal temperature at the same time in different countries 

 was brought forward, investigations having shewn that with 

 regard to Egypt and S.W. England the abnormal heat in the 

 latter in 1911 had been contemporaneous with an abnormally 

 cool summer in Egypt. On comparing the returns for 34 

 years it was further found that the departures from the 

 normal in the two countries were in opposite directions in all 

 seasons, but the results were much more definite in the first 

 and last quarters of the year. This discovery will doubtless 

 produce definite results in the comparison of other countries 

 as regards temperature, and advance our present very small 

 knowledge of its laws. One of those destructive tornadoes 

 which occasionally visit us and uproot trees, &c., in their 

 path, which is fortunately a narrow one, occurred on a larger 

 scale than is usual in this country, in S. Wales and in the 

 later part of its course, in Cheshire, on Oct. 27th last. The 

 width of the storm was about 200 yards, but along its course 

 two men were blown away for considerable distances and 

 killed, buildings were wrecked, trees uprooted, and great 

 damage done. Egyptian statistics shew that during 45 

 years (1868 1912) only 180 thunderstorms, including all 

 observations of even slight lightning, were recorded, and only 

 28 cases of hail or heavy rain. The forecasting of the weather 

 is still unfortunately a very uncertain matter, and from 

 comparisons with the actual state of things it has been 

 deduced that not very much more than half of the forecasts 

 are correct. Investigations of the upper air by means of 

 balloons have altered our ideas about it almost as much as 

 the discovery of radium has done about the temperature of 



