254 LIGHT SCIENCE FOR LEISURE HOURS. 



rainfalls probably due to some exceptional electrical 

 relations over parts of the Atlantic Ocean. It is 

 stated that the steamships from America this summer 

 were, in many instances, drenched by heavy showers 

 until they neared the coasts of England. 



(From the Daily Neivs, October o, 1868.) 



A SHOWER OF SNOW-CRYSTALS. 



YESTEKDAY morning a remarkably fine fall of snow* 

 stars took place over many parts of London. The 

 crystals were larger and more perfectly formed than is 

 commonly the case in our latitudes, where the con- 

 ditions requisite for the formation of these beautiful 

 objects are less perfectly fulfilled than in more northerly 

 regions. Many forms were to be noticed which the 

 researches of Scoresby, Glaisher, and Lowe, have shown 

 to be somewhat uncommon. 



Many of our readers will, perhaps, be surprised to 

 learn that no less than 1,000 different kinds of snow- 

 crystals have been noticed by the observers named 

 above, and that a large proportion of them have been 

 figured and described. The patterns are of wonderful 

 beauty. A strange circumstance connected with these 

 objects is the fact that for the most part they are 

 found, on a close examination, to be formed of minute 

 colored crystals some red, some green, others blue 



