REMARKS. 



The most notable features of the weather duriug the past month 

 were the high temperature and the small rainfall. The amount of 

 sunshine too has been unusually large, being 15% in excess of the 

 normal for April, and the last half of the month has been further 

 characterized by hot days and cool nights. 



The first eleven days of April were from 4^ to 20° colder than 

 normal and the season was decidedly backward. Then followed ten 

 days of very warm weather in the course of which the excess of tem- 

 perature reached a maximum of '2()^ above nornial on the 16th inst. 

 and during which vegetation was given a good start and made rapid 

 progress. While the temperature during the remainder of the month, 

 with the exception of the '2'M and 25th insts. was also above the 

 mean, the season since then has advanced more slowly. 



With reference to the excessively hot week about the middle of the 

 month when the temperature reached the unprecedented maximum of 

 <S8.5° at Amherst on the 16th inst., the New England Weather 

 Bureau reports that : — 



"Dnrino: the third week of the month, from April 14 to 20th, the tempera- 

 ture over the irreater part of the State averaged from 9" to 20" a day warmer 

 than usual for this period. This wee]\ was prot)al)ly the most abnormal witli 

 respect to the distritjution of temperature in the United States in the his- 

 tory of the Government Bureau. The whole eastern half of the country was 

 abnormally warm, reaclring an average of 24° a day above normal in the 

 vicinity of New York, while the western part of the United States was 

 abnormally cold, with a daily temperature of 21° below the normal in Mon- 

 tana. During this spell there was a trough of low pressure extending from 

 the eastern Lakes and St. Lawrence Gulf southwestward to Texas, with 

 indefinite cyclonic storm^• drifting slowly eastward, while over the south- 

 eastern coast and the northwestern part of the United States there were 

 areas of nearly stationary higli pressure. When sucli a distribution of air 

 pressure prevails we may always look for generally fair and warm weather 

 in New England." 



The past winter and early spring have been very severe on vegeta- 

 tion in the vicinity of Amherst. The peach crop was winter killed ; 

 cherry tree blossoms seem to be few in number, and winter grains, 

 clover, newly sown mowings, strawberries, raspberries and rose 

 bushes have been generally and seriously affected. 



Yet the season has advanced to its normal degree. des{)ite a num- 

 ber of frosts during the early part of the month, and duringtbe latter 

 part of the month, even, in the lowlands, though the deficiency 

 in rainfall is making itself felt to an increasing extent. 

 The small rainfall has had the ellect of delaying the settling 

 of the ground since the frost came out and of keeping the grass and 

 mowing back, but the continued clear and dry weather has brought 

 the soil into good condition for working and the weather has been 

 generally favorable for planting. Oats are generally sown ; and 

 early potatoes and onions have been planted. 



Cattle have been put out lo pasture to some extent. 



On the morning of April 1(5, 1896, Charles A. King, a member of the class 

 of '97 in the Massachusetts Agricultural College, and Oliserver at the Meteor- 

 ological Observatory of the Hatch Experiment Station, died of pneumonia. 

 He had been connected with tht' ol)sei'vatory work since the fall of 1894 and 

 and had been the Observer since August, 1895. A good student, a faithful 

 and honest observer, and a conscientious man, his death is not alone a grief 

 to his friends and instructors, but a loss to the Dei)artment and the Service. 



LEONARD METCALF, Acting Meteorologist. 

 JAMES L. BARTLETT, Observer. 



