88 Experimental Philosophy. [Lecture 7. 



warmer region. The fall of rain too, and many 

 other circumstances, may produce an alteration 

 in the temperature, which will be followed by a 

 change in the wind. 



The velocity of the wind has been frequently 

 measured with great accuracy, and varies under 

 different circumstances. It has been said of 

 swift horses, such as Childers and Eclipse, that 

 they outstripped the wind, and so they did 

 at its mean rate. But we ourselves can even go 

 faster than the wind in some states ; for in calm 

 weather, when its motion is just perceptible, its 

 velocity is not more than one or two miles in an 

 hour, and even a brisk wind Joes not travel at 

 the rate of more than 15 or 20 miles an hour. 

 Childers, on the contrary, is known (o have run 

 at the rate of nearly one mile in a minute, that is 

 at least 50 in the hour, which is equal to the ve- 

 locity of a storm. 



The storms which we experience in these happy 

 climates are as nothing when compared with those 

 dreadful convulsions of nature which are occa- 

 sionally felt in warmer latitudes, where the fruits 

 of a whole year's labour are often destroyed by a 

 single hurricane. These terrible phenomena 

 happen in the West Indies, generally in the rainy 

 season, about the month of August. They are 

 always preceded by an unusual calm ; but the 

 storm comes on suddenly, commonly accom- 

 panied with rain, thunder, and lightning, and 

 sometimes with an earthquake. Whole towns 



