448 Professor Elias Loomis. 



of it by new observers at needed points, a securing of the 

 cooperation of the British government and the Hudson's Bay 

 Company in the regions to the north of us, and finally a thor- 

 ough discussion of the observations collected. A siege of 

 three years was contemplated. In the history of the several 

 steps that finally led to the establishment of the United States 

 Signal Service, this report has an important place. 



The scheme laid down by Professor Loomis was in part fol- 

 lowed out by the Institution. But the fragmentary character 

 of the observations, the want of systematic distribution of the 

 places of the observers, and the imperfections of the barome- 

 ters, made the material collected difficult of discussion. Pro- 

 fessor Loomis waited in hopes of some better system. 



In 1 854, Professor Loomis undertook a rediscussion of the 

 storm of 1836, using the new methods introduced for treating 

 the storms of 1842. A visit to Europe shortly after enabled 

 him to collect a large number of observations upon a storm or 

 series of storms that occurred in Europe about a week later 

 than that American storm. He had long been anxious to con- 

 nect, if possible, these two storms, as he said, " stepping across 

 the Atlantic." The European and the American storms, how- 

 ever, not only proved to be distinct one from the other, but 

 the discussion showed clearly that many of the laws of Amer- 

 ican storms were radically different from those of the European 

 storms. The results of the whole discussion were published in 

 1859 by the Smithsonian Institution. 



Upon coming to New Haven, in 1860, he commenced the 

 collection of all the meteorological observations that had been 

 made in New Haven and the immediate vicinity, and suc- 

 ceeded in finding sets which, when brought together, made up 

 a nearly continuous record through 86 years. The results of 

 these observations formed the subject of a memoir published 

 by the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1866. 



It became part of his duties in college to deliver a course of 

 lectures upon the subject of meteorology. In preparation for 

 these he caused to be printed in very limited numbers the out- 

 lines of a treatise upon meteorology, to be used as the basis of 

 his series of lectures. In 1868 he developed this outline into a 

 treatise suited to use in college classes and in private study. 



