52 Prof. Loomis on Hail Storms. 
additional points upon which it was desirable that information 
should be obtained. In reply I received another letter from Dr. 
Hoyt accompanied by documents such as I had suggested. The 
following is extracted from his reply. 
‘* As yet I have been unable to substantiate the weight of a hail- 
stone at 20 ounces; yet throughout the town of Warren the 
impression prevails that one was so weighed. The enclosed af- 
fidavit of Mr. Libby, and statement of Mr: Flanders fixes the 
extreme weight of two stones weighed by them at 174 and 18 
ounces ; with the firm belief of Mr. Libby that had he weighed 
them at the time of falling, their weight would have been in- 
creased some two or three ounces. 
‘“‘T have the names of some two or three other individuals who 
storm weighed 14 ounces. A tin pail full containing fifteen, 
weighed 10 pounds—four collectively weighed three pounds, ete. 
Incredible as the above may appear to some, they are facts which 
can be proved by a multitude of evidence, 
“This storm was remarkable for the amount of ice which fell 
as well as the size of the stones. Mr. Flanders thinks that in 
Benton the average depth of the hail was about four inches, and 
from enquiry along the track of the storm, I should judge that 
he is not far from right in his estimate. The extreme width of the 
hail was about two miles, and the length over a cultivated dis- 
trict perhaps about five or six miles. How far east it extended I 
e no means of knowing, as it entered a forest of many miles 
in width. The largest hail stones fell near the edge or skirts of 
its track ; the thiciest and greatest amount or depth of hail fell in 
the centre. Although the sun came out “boiling hot” as one man 
expressed it, after the shower, still the hail remained on the 
ground in many places until the next day. An owner of asa 
mill, on the stream of water which has its source in the forests 
over which the shower passed, told me that the water kept swollen 
for two or three days, when from common showers of rain It 
would have fallen in twenty-four hours. This he attributed to the 
gradual melting of so large a quantity of ice in the woods. I think 
there was but little if any difference in the distribution of the 
large stones along the track, as the two whose weights are given 
by Mr. Flanders and Mr. Libby were picked up about five miles 
apart, and near the extremes of its track before it entered the 
forest. On the borders or skirts of the cloud the large stones fell 
scattering, and as it approached the centre it was as if the whole 
contents of the cloud were let down in ice. During the time 
the hail, which lasted some twenty or thirty minutes, there was 
but little rain ; after the hail it rained briskly for ten or fifteet 
minutes.  pten? alti antlers & emied cioasisiaee 
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