No. 4.] REPORT OF SECRETARY. ix 



The weather for the month of July was cool and wet, with 

 an excess of cloudy and rainy days. Both the maximum 

 and minimum temperatures were somewhat below the figures 

 generally recorded, the latter unusually so. On the morning 

 of the 28th the mercury ran down to within less than ten 

 degrees of the freezing point of water. At Springfield the 

 mean for the month (69.6°) was the lowest July mean 

 recorded during a period of twenty-four years, covering 

 from 1868 tp 1891. At Fitchburg, where there is a series 

 of observations beginning in 1857, the years 1860, 1865, and 

 1884 only show a July mean lower than the present, the 

 lowest being 66.6° in 1860, just one degree lower than in 

 1891. The records at the weather service office in Boston 

 show lower July means in 1881, 1884 and 1888, the lowest 

 being in 1884, and also just one degree lower than in 1891. 

 At Thompson, Conn., where observations for nearly half a 

 century have been made, and with a thermometer that has 

 hung in nearly the same position during all that time, the 

 mean was the lowest, with one exception, ever recorded. 

 That was in 1859, when the mean was 64.9°, less than one- 

 half degree lower than in 1891. 



The precipitation was generally heaviest and the number 

 of rainy days greatest in the Connecticut valley, while the 

 least precipitation fell over that section between the Connecti- 

 cut valley and the coast region. Thunder-storms were not 

 frequent or unusually severe. Hail fell at Cheshire on the 

 20th, during the progress of a thunder-storm. 



The mean temperature for the month of August, at those 

 stations in Massachusetts having records for more than ten 

 years, was slightly above the normal, being somewhat in 

 contrast with the month of July in this respect. The days 

 of highest temperature were the 10th, 11th and 12th. The 

 maximum was several degrees lower than was experienced 

 in June (an unusual fact), and occurred on the 11th, except 

 along the coast, where a well-defined sea-breeze was felt. 

 The minimum temperature occurred generally on the morn- 

 ing of the 1st, but it was very cool on the 3d, 20th and the 

 last three days of the month. 



The number of cloudy and rainy days was in excess, 

 except at Nantucket and a few other local sections, but the 



