August 25, 1911] 



SCIENCE 



247 



around the world investigating the aerological 

 work of the leading nations. The weather 

 service of Japan is about to inaugurate re- 

 search of this kind, and for this reason Pro- 

 fessor Terada was delegated with the task of 

 studying the methods and inspecting the 

 apparatus now in use in other countries. The 

 second representative was Mr. Edward C. 

 Barton, of Brisbane, Australia, who visited 

 the United States and Canada for the purpose 

 of studying meteorological work with the hope 

 that the information thus gained might be 

 used to improve the Australian weather serv- 

 ice. Methods of collecting and disseminating 

 data, forecasting, the publication of weather 

 maps and the instruction offered both under 

 the government and independently among 

 the colleges were especially investigated by 

 Mr. Barton. Pilot and sounding balloons are 

 now used in upper air research in Australia, 

 but kite flying for meteorological purposes has 

 not been begun as yet. 



A PAPER entitled " The Vertical Tempera- 

 ture Distribution in the Atmosphere Over 

 England, and Some Remarks on the General 

 and Local Circulation " was read before the 

 Eoyal Society of London by Mr. W. H. Dines 

 on May 11, 1911, and is published in the tran- 

 sactions of that society. It is based upon the 

 results obtained from about two hundred 

 sounding balloon ascensions in England dur- 

 ing the last four years. He says, " Any one 

 working up these figures can not fail to notice 

 that the temperature of the upper air over 

 England is largely dependent upon the height 

 of the barometer, and that above ten kilo- 

 meters the temperature is far more depend- 

 ent upon the barometer than it is upon the 

 season." Tables which he gives show that the 

 lower strata are cold in a cyclone and warm 

 in an anticyclone, a condition which is re- 

 versed above. At ten kilometers the inter- 

 mediate type of weather has the lowest tem- 

 perature, the temperature gradient ceasing at 

 eight kilometers in the cyclone, but not until 

 twelve kilometers in the anticyclone. Tem- 

 perature conditions indicate an ascending cur- 

 rent in a cyclone starting close to the ground 



and reaching up to the isothermal region, the 

 stratosphere, and extending over a larger and 

 larger area as it rises, the whole forming 

 roughly the frustrum of a cone with its apex 

 downwards. In an anticyclone it starts from 

 a height of about eleven kilometers, spread- 

 ing out as it descends, it too forming a cone, 

 but with its apex upwards. The height of the 

 isothermal region varies directly with the 

 barometric pressure at the ground, while the 

 temperature of the air at the commencement 

 of the isothermal varies inversely as the 

 latter. He also finds that the annual range in 

 temperature decreases from the surface up to 

 two or three kilometers; it then continues 

 nearly constant up to about eleven kilometers, 

 at which point it is abruptly reduced to less 

 than half its former value. In the strata 

 above one or two kilometers the maximum 

 and minimum values are delayed for about 

 a month, but above the point at which the 

 vertical gradient ceases they occur at the 

 summer and winter solstices. If the theory 

 of local circulation given be correct it fol- 

 lows that the winds must continue upwards 

 to the height at which the isobaric surfaces 

 are level planes, or rather spheroids concentric 

 with the earth, a height estimated at twenty 

 kilometers. 



One of the most valuable fields of activity 

 of the U. S. Weather Bureau is that related 

 to frost, concerning which several interesting 

 articles appear in recent numbers of the 

 Monthly Weather Review. In the January 

 number Mr. W. M. Walton, Jr., tells how, 

 after burning 3,300 gallons of fuel oil in 

 heaters placed in a fruit orchard in Indiana 

 during the cold April of 1910, the blossoms 

 were protected until the twenty-second, when 

 a high northwest wind accompanied by a tem.- 

 perature of 25° destroyed all prospects of tree 

 and bush fruit crops. However, two acres of 

 strawberries gave an abnormally large crop 

 after they had been protected by means of 

 180 oil heaters during three nights of frost 

 with temperatures down to 25° and lower. 

 In two papers in the February number, Pro- 

 fessor Alexander G. McAdie, of San Fran- 



