R A 1 



R A 1 



The animals, wliich thus colour tlie wattr of lakei and 

 ponds, are the puUccs arborefcenles of Swammerdatn, or the 

 water-fteas with branched horns. Tlii-fe crcaturc-s are of a 

 reddifh -yellow, or flame colour ; they live about tiie fides 

 of ditches, under weeds, and anionjr the mud, and are 

 therefore the lefs vifiblc, except at a certain time, which is 

 in the end of May or beginning of June : it is at this time 

 that thefe little animals leave their recedes to float loofe 

 about the water, to meet for the propagation of their 

 fpecies, and by that means become vifible in the colour they 

 give the water. Tliis is vifible, more or leis, in one part or 

 other of alniofl: all Handing waters at this feafon ; and it is 

 always at this feafon that the bloody waters have alarmed 

 the ignorant. 



The raining of frogs is a thing not lefs wonderful in the 

 accounts of authors who love the marvellous, than thofe of 

 blood, or of Hones ; and this is fuppoied to happen fo often, 

 that there are multitudes who pretend to have been eye-wit- 

 nefles of it. Thefe rains of frogs always happen after 

 very dry fcafons, and arc much more frequent in the hotter 

 countries than the cold ones. In Italy they are very fre- 

 quent ; and it is not uncommon to fee the ftreets of Rome 

 fwarming both with young frogs and toads in an inft;ant, in 

 a ihower of rain ; they hopping every where between the 

 people's legs, as they walk, though tliere was not the lealt 

 appearance of them before. Nay, they have been fecn to 

 fall through the air down upon the pavements. This feenis 

 a ilrong circuinitance in favour of their being rained down 

 from the clouds, but when flriftly examined, it comes to 

 nothing ; for thefe frogs, that arc feen to fall, arc always 

 found dead, lamed, or bruifed by the fall, and never hop 

 about as the reil ; and they are never feen to fall, except 

 clofe under the walls of houfes, from the roofs and gutters 

 of which they have accidentally flipped down. 



To the raining of frogs ue ought to add the raining of 

 grafs-hoppers and locufts, which have fometimes appeared in 

 prodigious numbers, and devoured the fruits of the earth. 

 There has not been the leall pretence for fuppofing that 

 thefe animals dcfcended from the clouds, but that they ap- 

 peared on a fudden in prodigious numbers. The naturalilt, 

 who knows the many accidents attending the eggs ot thefe, 

 and other tho like aiiinials, cannot but know that fome fea- 

 fons will prove particularly favourable to the hatching of 

 them, and the prodigious number of eggs that many infedls 

 lay, could not but every year bring us Inch abundance of the 

 young, were they not liable to many accidents, and had not 

 provident nature taken care, as in many plants, to continue 

 the fpecies by a very numerous flock of feeds, ot which per- 

 haps not one in five hundred need take root, in order to con- 

 tinue an equal number of plants. , 



The raining of fifhes has been a prodigy alfo much talked 

 of in France, where the itreets of a town at fome dillance 

 from Paris, after a terrible hurricane in the night, which 

 tore up trees, blew down lioufes, &c. were found in a man- 

 ner covered with filhes of various fizes. Nobody here made 

 any doubt of thefe having fallen from the clouds ; nor did 

 the abfurdity of fifti, of live or fix inches long, being gene- 

 rated in the air, at all ftartle the people, or fliake their be- 

 lief in the miracle, till they found upon enquiry that a very 

 well-!locked fifh-pond, which Hood on an eminence in the 

 neighbourhood, had been blown dry by the hurricane, and 

 only the great filli left at the bottom of it, all the fmaller 

 fry having been tolfed into their ftreets. 



Upon the whole, all the fuppofed marvellous rains have 

 been owing to fubttances naturally produced on the earth, 

 and either never having been in the air at all, or only carried 

 thither by accident. 

 Voi. XXIX. 



Rain, Freezing. See Freezing. 



RA1S-Jiit\/, in Oniitholo^y. See CucULt's Pluviaiis. 



KAiN-Fn'zu/, an Englifh name given by many to the com- 

 mon green woodpecker, or picui ■viriJis, from aa obferva. 

 tion that it is always mofl clamorous when rainy weather is 

 coming on. The Latins liave, for the fame reafon, called 

 It the pluviaiis avis. See Picus. 



Rain-Gj^c, called alfo Omirometrr and Pluviometer, an 

 inftrument for meafuriiig the quantity of rain that falls. 

 That which is mentioned under the jaticle Ombromkter, 

 confifts of a tin funnel d { Pklc XXIV. Mifcellany, fg. 2.), 

 whofe furface is an inch fquare, a flat board a a, and a glalu 

 tube b h, fct into the middle ot it in a groove, and an index 

 witli divifions c, c ; the board and tube being of any length 

 at pleafvire. The bore of the tube is about half an inch, 

 which, fays Mr. Pickering, the inventor, is the bell fize. 

 This machine is fixed in fome free and open place, as the 

 top of the houfe, &c. 



The rain-gage employed in llie houfe of the Royal vSo- 

 ciety, is defcribed by Mr. Cavendifh in the Phil. Trnnf. 

 for 1776, p. 384. The vcfTel which receives the rain is a 

 conical funnel, Itrengthened at the top by a brafs ring, twelve 

 inches in diameter. The fides of the funnel, and inner lip 

 of the brafs ring, are inclined to the horizon, at an angle ot 

 above 65-, and the outer lip at an angle of above 50^ which 

 are fuch degrees of fteepnefs, that there feems to be no pro- 

 babihtv cither that any rain which falls within the funnel, or 

 on tile inner lip of tlie ring, (hould dafli out, or that any 

 which falls on the outer lip (hould dafh into the tunnel. A 

 vertical fedlion of the funnel appears in Plate XXIV. 

 Mifcellany, fg. 3 ; A B C and a b c being the brafs ring, 

 B A and b a the inner lip, and B C and b c the outer. This 

 ved'el is placed on fome flat leads, 0:1 the top of the fociety's 

 houfe. It can hardly be fcreened from any rain by the 

 chimnies, as none of them are elevated above it in an angle 

 of more than 25", and as it is raifed 3^ feet above the roof, 

 there feems no danger of any rain dafliing into it by rebound- 

 ing from the lead. 



In fixing rain-gages care fiiould be taken that tlie rain 

 may have free accefs to them, without being impeded or 

 overfliaded by buildings, &c. and therefore the tops of 

 houfes are to be preferred. Alfo, when the quantities 

 of rain coUefted in them, at different places, are compared 

 together, the intlruinents ought to be fixed at the fame 

 height above the ground at both places ; becaufe at different 

 heights the quantities are always different, even in the fame 

 place. And hence alfo, any regifter or account of rain m 

 the gage ought to be accompanied with a note of the lieight 

 at which the inllrument is placed above the ground. Dal- 

 ton found the rain of a gage 50 yai'ds high, in fummer 

 two-thirds, and in winter one-half as much as that of a 

 gage below. Mr. Dalton obferves, that a flrong funnel, 

 made of fheet iron, tinned and painted, with a perpen- 

 dicular rim, two or three inches high, fixed horizon- 

 tally in a convenient frame, with a bottle under it to re- 

 ceive the rain, is fufficient for this purpofe. 



The rain-gage is an invention which fhould be in the pof- 

 fefhon of every correft farmer in every part of the kingdom, 

 and which would thereby have much tendency to the im- 

 provement of agriculture as contributing to the knowledge 

 of the degree of moiiture which prevails in thi foils, after 

 fhowers cr heavy rains, with greater accuracy and correft- 

 nefs than has been hitherto the cafe. 



It is noticed by Mr. Naifmith, in his Agricultural Survey 

 of Clydefdale, that profeflor Anderfon, of the univerfity of 

 Glafgow, has invented, perhaps, themoft ingenious and ac- 

 curate rain-gage of any that has yet been known. It receive!" 

 Z 2 the 



