Meteorology for Farmers. 



HE following is an extract from a communication made by 

 Lieut. Maury to the American Farmer, Baltimore, on the im- 

 portance of organizing a system of national meteorological 

 observations, with a view of promoting thereby the great 

 interests of agriculture. Lieut. M. says 



"You ask for the plan of co-operation. It is very simple, 

 and calls on the farmers for little more than good will. I first 

 want authority to take the preliminary steps, and to confer 

 with other meteorologists and men of science at home amd 

 abroad, with the view of establishing a uniform system of 

 meteorological observations for the land, as we have done for 

 the sea. If any officer of the government were authorized to 

 say to the farmers, as I have to the sailors, 'Here is the form of a meteorological journal; it 

 shows you the observations that are wanted, the hours at which they are to be made ; tells 

 what instruments are required, and how they are to be used : take it, furnish the government 

 with the observations, and in return the government will discuss them, and give you a copy 

 of the results when published' he would have at once and without cost a volunteer corps of 

 observers that would furnish him with all the data requisite for a complete study of both agri- 

 cultural and sanitary meteorology. Such an offer to the sailors has enlisted a corps of 

 observers for the sea, by whose co-operation results the most important and valuable, and as 

 unexpected as valuable, have been obtained. Could not at least one farmer be found on the 

 average for every county in every State that would gladly undertake the observations? I 

 don't think there would be any difficulty on that score. Sailors have been found to do as 

 much for every part of the sea : on the average, ten observers for a State would be sufficient. 

 Now if we could get the English government, and the French government, and the Russian 

 government, and the other Christian states both of the Old World and the New, to do the same 

 by their farmers, we shall have the whole surface of our planet covered with meteorological 

 observers acting in concert, and eliciting from nature, under all varieties of climate and cir- 

 cumstances, answers to the same questions ; and that too at no other expense than what each 

 government should choose to incur for the discussion and publication of the observations that 

 are made by its own citizens or subjects. 



"What is wanted in a system of observations like this is uniformity. Hence, co-operation- - 

 an agreement to observe the same things at the same times is essential to any thing like 

 success. We want not only corresponding observations as to the time, but we want them 

 made with instruments that are alike, or that can be compared ; and then we may expect to 

 find out something certain and valuable concerning the movements of this grand and beauti- 

 ful machine called the atmosphere. Suppose a pretentious fly should place itself upon a 

 steam-engine, and -from its own little, narrow, contracted field of observation, attempt to 

 expound the structure of the entire machine. If it had the intelligence both to observe and 

 to reason, it would not find itself more bewildered than any one does and must, who, from an 

 isolated series of meteorological observations, attempts to learn the laws which govern the 

 atmosphere and regulate climates. If you ask me to state beforehand what particular dis- 

 coveries or special results of value I expect to make, I answer: If I could tell, I would not 



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