186 Wature'0 



of electricity rather than heat, as is the case 

 under more ordinary circumstances. While 

 in the end this electrical energy becomes 

 active heat, it does not for the time being, and 

 thus favors the ready congelation of the con- 

 densed moisture into hailstones. Hailstorms 

 are always attended by incessant thunder and 

 lightning, and this fact favors the theory ad- 

 vanced above. 



It will be easily seen from a study of the 

 foregoing what a wonderful factor evaporation 

 (which is a product of the sun's rays) is, in 

 the play of celestial dynamics. It ascends 

 from the surface of the earth or ocean laden 

 with a stored energy, the power of which no 

 man can compute, and beside which gravita- 

 tion is a mere point. In the upper regions of 

 atmosphere this potential force under certain 

 conditions is released and becomes an active 

 factor, not only in the formation of cloud and 

 the precipitation of rain, hail, and snow, but 

 it disturbs the equilibrium of the air and sets 

 that in motion. 



Certain physicists deny that evaporation has 

 anything to do with atmospheric electricity. 

 They tell us that it is caused by the arrest of 

 the energy of the sunbeam by the clouds and 

 vapor in the upper atmosphere. We admit 

 that a part of the energy is so arrested, and is 

 stored, for the time, in moisture globules by a 

 process of cloud evaporation to transparent 



