BY THE REV. W. B. CLARKE, M.A., F.G.S. &c., V.P. 167 



commence a little north of Moreton Bay, but move up and down 

 with the sun. Now, if these winds at any time extended them- 

 selves unusually far south, a wet season might be produced along 

 the S.E. coast. This theory finds support, I believe, from the 

 Rev. W. B. Clarke, who has watched and investigated the climate 

 many years. 



" Just the same effect would be produced, if any cause acted 

 from the centre of Australia to hinder the advent of sea winds, 

 and project the fiery breath of the sun-heated plains upon the 

 unexpectiiig coast lands, or during hot winds." And then he 

 adds, with needful caution, " these are mere speculations ; to 

 reason accurately upon such wide-acting causes, will not be within 

 any person's power till meteorology is quite another thing. 

 Australia is more sea-surrounded than any other large surface 

 of land, and, as it is only over the wide ocean that the winds 

 perform their normal course, meteorology is, perhaps, a simpler 

 problem in this land than anywhere else." 



There is a fact also mentioned by Mr. Jevons, which must be 

 borne in mind, that in Australia similar phenomena are apt to 

 prevail almost synchronously over very wide areas. On one 

 occasion, at least, a severe hot wind was felt from Moreton Bay 

 to Port Phillip, a distance of at least 800 miles ; rains are equally 

 general at times, and what I have already pointed out in comparing 

 the weather near Sydney with that in Mr. Kennedy's experience in 

 the interior, and what the late Admiral King found in comparing 

 Paramatta with Sir T. L. Mitchell's experience in Tropical 

 Australia, the laws affecting the barometer are nearly constant. 



In any discussion on storms in Australia these facts should be 

 borne in mind. 



I must now apologise for referring to my own individual 

 efforts in this region of science. Probably, from their distant 

 date and the manner in which they were published, my earlier 

 attempts to interest the Australian community in the laws of 

 storms may have passed somewhat out of view. And it is pro- 

 bable, that at that time Mr. Tebbutt may have been too young to 

 notice such a subject in the columns of a public journal. But, 

 twenty-two years ago, in the month of January, 1842, 1 published 

 the particulars of a great storm that had just traversed the whole 



