4 Mr. II. F. Blanford. On the Connexion of the [May 1, 



it is probable, that with more or less modification according to the 

 local geography, causes of a similar character will be found equally 

 operative in other regions, and perhaps on an even more extensive 



Empirical Ground* of the Hypot/ietit. 



Tlie Year 1876 and 1877. The probable dependence of dry land 

 wimls and of periods of drought on the extent of the Himalayan 

 simwtirlcl.s first occurred to me when inquiring into the meteorology 

 of India in 1876, a year disastrously notorious for that failure of the 

 rainfall which produced the last great famine in Madras and the 

 Deccan ; and the first reference to the subject, as far as I am aware, 

 will be found in the official report for that year. In summing up the 

 results of the detailed description of the meteorological features of 

 the year, and in tracing out the apparent dependence of the drought 

 on the remarkable and unseasonable persistence of dry north- 

 west winds down the whole of Western India, I was led on to connect 

 these successively with the high pressure prevailing in the Upper 

 Provinces and Bombay, relatively to Orissa and Eastern India, and 

 with the low temperature of North- Western India in the spring of 

 the year, as contrasted with the abnormally high temperature of the 

 east of the peninsula, and I remarked* that this latter fact seemed 

 " to argue that some cooling influence more potent than usual was 

 at work, probably in the Punjab and on the northern mountain zone, 

 condensing the lower strata of the atmosphere and causing an 

 unusual outflow of cooled air." A few lines further on, it was 

 observed, " it has been shown in the foregoing description of the rain- 

 fall, that in the early months of the year, the rainfall was unusually 

 copious over the North- Western Himalaya,f and the plains of the 

 Punjab which border the foot of the mountains, and indeed, on the 

 North- Western Himalaya the rainfall was above the average, more 

 or less, throughout the greater part of the year. The rain on the 

 outer hills is most frequently accompanied by snow on the main and 

 higher ranges, and indeed, when I visited Rawalpindi in the early 

 part of April, 1876, I was informed that snow lay in some thickness 

 at Murree, a very unusual occurrence so late in the season, and the 

 slopes of the Pir Punjal were visibly snowed down to a low level. 

 The question is therefore naturally suggested, whether the great 

 expanse of snow, presented under the circumstances by the southern 

 slopes of the Himalaya, and much of which fell unusually late in the 

 season, was not that cooling agent, to the existence of which the 



* Op. cit., page 96. 



t As will be seen further on, this is rather overstated. The heavy unusual fall 

 was restricted to March and April, and the total of the whole season was not above 

 the average, excrpt at Rawalpindi and one or' two other stations. 



