ARTICLE XII. 



On the Storm which was experienced throughout the United States about the 20th 

 0/ December, 1836. By Elias Loomis, Professor of Mathematics and Natural 

 Philosophy/ in Western Reserve College. Read March 20, 1840. 



Being well convinced that meteorology is to be promoted, not so much by 

 taking the mean of long-continued observations, as by studying the phenomena 

 of particular storms developed over a widely extended country, I resolved to 

 select some single storm of strongly marked characteristics, and trace its pro- 

 gress as extensively and minutely as possible. For this investigation I made 

 choice of the storm which occurred in the United States about the 20th of 

 December, 1836; not only because it seems well suited to my purpose, but 

 because I found ready furnished for my use a considerable number of most 

 valuable observations. In the eastern states this storm occurred within the 

 period recommended by Sir John Herschel for hourly meteorological observa- 

 tions, and all the phenomena of the storm were most carefully and minutely 

 recorded at eight different stations, namely, at Baltimore, New York, Albany, 

 Flushing, New Haven and Gardiner, in the United States; as, also, at Mon- 

 treal and Quebec, in Lower Canada. These observations, with the exception 

 of those at Baltimore, are published in the Report of the New York University 

 Register for 1837. I addressed a letter to each individual who, so far as I could 

 ascertain, kept a meteorological register, requesting an extract from the same 

 for the period in question. The result is that I have obtained barometric ob- 

 servations from twenty-seven different stations within the United States and 



VII — 2 G 



