98 FORESTRY OF NORWAY. 
tion is given, both in forest legislation and in forest 
administration, to the conservation of forests on mountain 
tops as a means of giving shelter to lower-lying lands to 
leeward, and as a means of preventing the formation of 
mountain torrents. Ihave no reason to suppose that the 
subject commands like attention in Norway. But meteoro- 
logical observations of storms and prevalent winds, and of 
atmospheric pressure are not awanting, and in view of the 
relation of winds to forests, I cite some of these report 
by Dr Broch, 2 hie 
Thunder storms and storms of rain are comparatively 
rare in Norway. They principally occur in the summer 
months. The winter storms fall almost exclusively on the 
west coast, from the Naze to Andenaes, in Vestrealen ; 
they come in heavy gales from the west. ee 
. The thunder storms come as a general rule with wind 
from the south and the south-west, of a high temperature, 
and loaded with aqueous vapour. They proceed often in 
a regular course across the country, and sometimes advance 
with a great extent of breadth, for example, from the Naze 
to Vest: fiord. Their mean rate of advance is 40 kilometres 
per hour, in a direction from south-west to north-east. 
The greater part of them are accompanied by great. whirl- 
winds along the south border. A portion of the storms 
are occasioned by the great heats which are produced in 
the interior of the country. These are amongst the least 
violent, 
_ The storms of Norway are everywhere greater and more 
frequent on the coast than in the interior. In the eastern 
part of the country, where they only appear in summer, 
there may be two or perhaps three in a year. They are 
also of like frequency in the interior, especially on the 
north part of Lake Miosen, as they are on the coast. It 
is on the shore, from the Naze to the Sogne fiord, that 
they are of greatest frequency in Norway; six or seven 
have been seen in the course of a year. From the Sogne 
fiord to the Drontheim fiord they are comparatively rare. 
They. are more frequent in the region which extends from 
