THE NEW SCIENCE OF METEOROLOGY 



casts meriting the title of predictions. This is in the 

 middle Ganges Valley of northern India. In this coun- 

 try the climatic conditions are largely dependent upon 

 the periodical winds called monsoons, which blow 

 steadily landward from April to October, and seaward 

 from October to April. The summer monsoons bring 

 the all-essential rains ; if they are delayed or restricted 

 in extent, there will be drought and consequent famine. 

 And such restriction of the monsoon is likely to result 

 when there has been an unusually deep or very late 

 snowfall on the Himalayas, because of the lowering of 

 spring temperature by the melting snow. Thus here 

 it is possible, by observing the snowfall in the moun- 

 tains, to predict with some measure of success the aver- 

 age rainfall of the following summer. The drought of 

 1896, with the consequent famine and plague that de- 

 vastated India the following winter, was thus pre- 

 dicted some months in advance. 



This is the greatest present triumph of practical me- 

 teorology. Nothing like it is yet possible anywhere in 

 temperate zones. But no one can say what may not 

 be possible in times to come, when the data now being 

 gathered all over the world shall at last be co-ordinated, 

 classified, and made the basis of broad inductions. 

 Meteorology is pre-eminently a science of the future. 



