594 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XV. No. 380. 



this country it is always ecology. It signiiies 

 the science of the adaptation of organisms 

 to their surroundings, a field of study in which 

 botanists have been more active than zoolo- 

 gists. Ecology is prominent in every elemen- 

 tary botanical text-book published recently in 

 this- country, and every schoolboy if taught 

 by a modern teacher, knows something of it. 

 W. P. Ganong. 



NOKTHAMPTOM", MASS., 



March 29, 1902. 



The dictionaries are well acquainted 

 with wcology, but have not yet discovered the 

 change to ecology. This is clearly an over- 

 sight, for they are usually glad to aid in the 

 improvement of spelling. 



G. K. Gilbert. 



[Many other letters have been received 

 pointing out that the word 'cecology' is to be 

 found in the dictionaries. If it did not occur 

 to our correspondent, who is the editor of the 

 New York Evening Post; that 'ecology' should 

 be looked up under 'cecology,' it would not to 

 others unacquainted with the term or its 

 etymology; and he appears to have supported 

 his main contention, which was that technical 

 terminology is a serious difiiculty in the way 

 of reading scientific literature by those who 

 are not experts in the given science. — Editor.] 



CURRENT NOTES ON METEOROLOGY. 



FOG IN" SWITZERLAND. 



As a thesis for the degree of Ph.D. at the 

 University of Bern, Gotfried Streun has pub- 

 lished an elaborate report on the fogs of Switz- 

 erland (4to, Zurich, 1901). The observations 

 used as a basis for this study were made in 

 1897 and 1898, and the work was carried on 

 under the supervision of Professor Briickner 

 and of Dr. Billwiller. The lowlands have a 

 maximum of fog in the morning, as a result 

 of the nocturnal cooling of the lower atmos- 

 phere, while the mountain summits show a 

 comparatively uniform distribution of fog 

 through the day. A weak afternoon maximum 

 at the latter stations is due to the formation 

 of cumulus clouds in the ascending valley 

 winds. The annual period of fogs is well 



marked in the lowlands and lower valleys, 

 where there are autumn and winter maxima, 

 but on the mountain sununits there is hardly 

 any trace of annual periodicity. As regards 

 the average duration of spells of foggy 

 weather, it appears that single days with fog 

 occur most frequently at the lower levels, 

 where the periods of greatest length come in 

 fall and winter. On the Santis the longest 

 periods of fog come in spring and summer. 

 At these altitudes continuous fogs frequently 

 last for more than twenty days, while on the 

 lowlands a fog of eight days' duration is a 

 rarity. The general weather conditions under 

 which lowland fogs are formed in winter are 

 distinctly anticyclonic, while those accompany- 

 ing high-level fogs are distinctly cyclonic, in 

 both summer and winter. In connection with 

 his study of the conditions of fog occurrence, 

 the author finds confirmation of the Hann 

 theory of cyclones. Numerous charts accom.- 

 pany this monograph. They show the fre- 

 quency of foggy days, and the occurrence of 

 fogs during a remarkable foggy spell from 

 October 26 to November 25, 1897. The effect 

 of topography on the development of fogs is 

 strikingly brought out by these charts. 



HAIL PREVENTION. 



In the Eeport of the Chief of the Weather 

 Bureau for 1901 (Annual Reports, Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture) Professor W. L. Moore 

 makes a protest against the spread in the 

 United States of the popular delusion that 

 destructive hail storms can be successfully pre- 

 vented by cannon-firing. Some little time 

 ago Drs. Pernter and Trabert, the well-known 

 meteorologists of the Vienna Observatory, 

 were invited by the Austrian Department of 

 Agriculture, and by the inventor of one of 

 the methods of cannonading, to study the con- 

 ditions and results of the bombardment on the 

 ground. The investigation which was carried 

 out was as complete as it was possible to make 

 it, and the sum and substance of the report 

 was that nothing positive could be said as to 

 the value of the shooting. Scientific men who 

 cannot visit the scene of the cannonading 

 themselves, and who need any authority for 

 their doiibt as to the efficacy of the 'hail shoot- 



