A year's weatheb. 389 



So far as I can judge, the oak and the ash simultaneously- 

 broke into leaf here at the beginning of May. A comparison of 

 hundreds of the trees, at dozens of places, gave the best foliage 

 first to the oak and then to the ash. Perhaps observers in other 

 localities may decide for me. 



On May i yth we had slight evidence of the earthquake which 

 visited Cornwall ; its rumbling was heard by Dr. Sharp, at Truro, 

 at 1.30 a.m., and he gave me another case where it was heard 

 near the city about the same hour. My only personal evidence is 

 the knocking down of a series of Cornish birds from their stands 

 in the museum. The line of fallen birds ran north and south, and 

 on naming this fact, the doctor tells me, the report was heard to 

 die out in a similar direction in the Helston district, where the 

 shock was most intense. 



I am told that not only have three cuckoos been seen on trees 

 hereabouts, each calling, as mentioned in my last letter, at the 

 same time, but that at Cuckoo Bottom, near Truro, it is no unusual 

 thing to hear three of these birds calling at once from the telegraph 

 wires. Mr. Blenkinsop gives me the 26th, as the earliest date 

 for hearing the landrail in this district, which is late. I saw the 

 swift at Truro on the 3rd. 1 have had several communications 

 respecting observations in my last weather letter, which, I think 

 should be mentioned here,and as these weather letters are intended 

 to be familiar and chatty monthly records, observations from other 

 sources embodied in them make them doubly valuable. 



The Rev. C. F. Rogers, Sithney Vicarage, Helston, says, 

 " I observed several swallows on the sea coast between Porthleven 

 and the Loe Bar on Thursday April 14th." Our first arrival at 

 Truro was the 22nd. Mr. Wilkinson, Riviere, Hayle, says, "My 

 experience of the weather at the beginning of April was very 

 different from yours at Truro. Of the first twelve days nine of 

 them were accompanied by cold winds, and only three were 

 comfortably warm." I have had a similar experience myself on 

 the north and south coasts this month. Mr. Wilkinson also gives 

 the swallow's first appearance as March 22nd, one month earlier 

 then ours. On March 23 rd he again saw, in the presence of two 

 of his neighbours, three more of these birds. This record is 

 exceptionally early. 



