146 H. C. RUSSELL. 



diameter at the clouds and ten feet at the sea surface, it was 

 estimated to be four times as high as a ship's masts, say 650 feet, 

 and lasted fifteen minutes. At 2 10 p.m. of the same day another 

 water-spout formed under a dark cloud about three miles east of 

 the point at which the earlier one was formed ; it was not so 

 large and of a much lighter colour, but did not reach the water 

 and lasted only ten minutes. 



August 17th, 1894. — On this date the Signal Master at Sydney 

 reported a water-spout forming from a dark cloud six miles dis- 

 tant to south-east, wind south, fresh. " The water -spout was 

 travelling fast and seemed to be taking up great quantities of 

 water during the whole time it was visible; it disappeared at 5 p.m. 

 twelve miles distant in north-north-east. The size and form 

 changed as it went along, and all the way the water under it in a 

 circular spot about twenty feet in diameter was white like foam 

 as if water was being sucked up or poured down. {Plate 4, Figs. 

 1 to 4). When it was about eight miles to north-north-east and 

 close in to the land the spout got larger, and shortly after it 

 extended downwards to the water and then became the same width 

 from cloud to sea (Fig. 5); at this time although twelve miles 

 distant, it was clearly defined. My rough estimate would make 

 the greatest diameter sixty feet, and length under two hundred 

 feet, but when it extended to the water {Plate 4, Figs. 1 to 6) it 

 must have been four hundred feet long." 



August 18th, 1894. — Mr. Richard Taplin, Master of s.s. Burra- 

 wong, writes: — "When fifteen miles south of Seal Rocks and 

 going south we saw before us a waterspout in the midst of a black 

 and heavy looking rain cloud ; it looked like a bright funnel and 

 the tube descended to the sea, which it lashed into a fierce whirl- 

 pool, [Plate 9) it was travelling to north-west and passed us three- 

 quarters of a mile to westward. I estimated the speed it was 

 travelling forward at about twelve to fifteen miles per hour. The 

 second one was not so large, but otherwise very similar, and it 

 passed away in the same direction. The third and last one was very 

 beautiful ; it formed under the south-eastern extremity of the very 



