374 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. L. No. 1294 



introductory note he gives a few details re- 

 garding the manuscript, which he believes was 

 written in 1795 or 1796. One of the most 

 interesting of Dolomieu's statements regards 

 the gold deposits of La Gardette, an elevation 

 in the southern part of Dauphine.i Here 

 gold was found in a quartz vein traversing a 

 gneissic formation, at about 1,500 feet above 

 the plain of Bourg d'Oisans, in the present 

 department of Isere. As early as 1717 peas- 

 ants are said to have picked up here yellow 

 stones which when assayed in Grenoble were 

 found to contain gold. In 1778 serious at- 

 tempts were made to work this vein and a 

 certain quantity of gold was extracted, a part 

 of which was sent in the form of an ingot to 

 the Comte de Provence, later Louis XVIII, 

 who caused a medal to be struck out of this 

 gold.- 



G. F. K. 



NOTES ON METEOROLOGY AND 

 CLIMATOLOGY 



THE TRANS-ATLANTIC FLIGHTS AND OCEAN 

 WEATHER MAPS 



Although some attempt has been made to 

 post daily weather maps of the North At- 

 lantic in the ISTew York Customs House, the 

 occasions of trans-Atlantic flights first brought 

 forth daily weather maps of the ITorth At- 

 lantic from which oceanwide forecasts were 

 made. In fact, for a short time in the middle 

 of May such weather maps were being made 

 every sis hours from weather reports received 

 by radio from European and American land 

 stations and from the five American battle- 

 ships and ten destroyers spread over the At- 

 lantic between latitudes 36° and 51° N". 



Unfavorable winds for the flight of the NC 

 planes to the Azores lasted until May 16, 

 when in the rear of a low pressure trough, 

 fair weather and westerly winds prevailed 

 from ISTewfoundland nearly to the Azores. 

 Thinking (justifiably, as it proved) that such 

 favorable conditions would not last long and 



1 Op. cit., pp. 16-20. 



2 In Professor Laeroix's great work "Minfiral- 

 ogie de la France et de ses Colonies," Vol., 1897, 

 p. 422, this medal is figured. 



would not continue again for some time, the 

 forecasters advised that conditions were favor- 

 able for the start of the flight to the Azores. 

 The second stage of the flight of the NC-4 to 

 Lisbon was delayed till the twenty-seventh, 

 when a following wind appreciably shortened 

 this long flight. A detailed account of " The 

 first trans-Atlantic flight," with 14 weather 

 maps of the North Atlantic, May 12-20 and 

 27-31 and of the forecasts in this connection, 

 by W. E. Gregg and E. H. Bowie have been 

 published in the Monthly Weather BevieWj 

 May, 1919, pp. 279-282, 347. 



In addition to such weather information as 

 the Americans gave the British aviators on 

 this occasion, the British Meteorological Office 

 was actively engaged in getting weather re- 

 ports from merchant ships on the ocean along 

 the route from Newfoundland to Ireland. As 

 many have no radio outfits, and as only an 

 occasional ship can send reports more than a 

 few hmidred miles, the conditions along this 

 course have been but poorly known in time to 

 be helpful. Stormy weather on either coast 

 kept aviators from starting, but the lack of 

 stormy conditions on either coast did not 

 mean safety in mid-ocean. Messrs. Hawker 

 and Grieve, after leaving Newfoundland, May 

 18, ran into the northern part of the storm 

 which was so distressing to the crew of the 

 NC-3. In spite of climbing to a considerable 

 height they were unable to get above the 

 clouds; and the strong north wind hindered 

 their progress appreciably.^^ 



Although Messrs. Alcock and Brown also ex- 

 perienced considerable cloudiness, the wind 

 conditions, strong westerly all the way, appear 

 to have been ideal for their flight from New- 

 foundland to Ireland, June 14-15. If they 

 flew on a great circle course the average speed 

 was about 120 miles an hour.^^ 



By the time the E-34 was ready to make its 

 trip to America, the receipt of weather reports 

 by radio from vessels at sea was better, though 

 there were great stretches from which no in- 



11 See Monthly Weather Beview, May, 1919, p. 

 283. 



12 See account and weather maps in the Monthly 

 Weather Beview, June, 1919, p. 416, charts X. 

 and XI. 



