298 REMARKS ON THE LAW OF STORMS. 
hills, gives reason to believe the body of the hurricane was like a 
truncated cone inverted, which, perhaps, when this knowledge is 
raised to a higher pitch, and these appearances better understood, 
may be found a necessary form not only for hurricanes, but all kinds 
of spouts and whirlwinds.” 
It is not necessary to follow the author in his minute details of the 
devastation caused by this hurricane. Suffice it to say that it levelled 
buildings, tore up by the roots, splintered, or destroyed a vast number 
of oak trees, to the number of 1,300 or 1,400 on one estate alone. 
The description is valuable for it proved from ocular demonstration 
the theory of the rotary and progressive motion of storms, as set 
forth by the author. We need not dwell upon the latter portion of ~ 
his essay, in which he endeavours to account for the origin of these 
awful phenomena. Budgen admits the necessity of more extended 
observation in after times as a fit employment for some “philosophical 
genius.” His words are, (page 11),—‘* Neither does it appear to me 
that any just conclusion from reasoning can be produced without 
being furnished not only with a long series of observations, but a 
good collection of such kind of experiments as have not yet been 
tried, or at least never published ;” and the object of his tract was to 
“ eollect such certain facts as had the appearance of being most useful, 
and assisting to lead a philosophical enquirer towards the causes.” 
We see then, in the pamphlet before us, the law of storms clearly 
enunciated. The hurricane, from actual observation, is found to 
have a progressive motion nearly in a straight line, and, at the same 
time, a circular motion contra-solem, and we see that this doctrine 
was established by R. Budgen one hundred and twenty-nine years ago. 
Now, in the Foreign Quarterly Review, we read the following state- 
ment: “Col. Reid lays no claim to originality in this discovery (7.e., 
the Law of Storms) which belongs essentially to Mr. Redfield, of 
New York, who was the first person (Col. Reid says) that gave any 
just notion of the nature of hurricanes. It is due to Mr. Redfield 
to mention that until Col. Reid informed him of Col. Coppers having 
previously suggested the rotary theory of storms, he was quite igno- 
rant of the fact. The doctrine held by Mr. Redfield, and we think 
substantiated by the facts brought together by him and Col. Reid, is 
that a hurricane or great gale is simply a whirlwind revolving in a 
direction contrary to the hands of a watch, or from right to left, sup- 
posing yourself in its centre, and that at the same time the centre of 
