58 



H. C. RUSSELL. 



miles per hour: and such a result, though of no commercial utility 

 would mark an epoch in the art at least as hopeful as the earliest 

 attempts at marine steam propulsion. 



A CYCLONIC STORM OR TORNADO IN THE GWYDIR 



DISTRICT. 



By H. C. Russell, b.a., c.m.g., f.r.s. 



[Bead before the Royal Society of N.S. Wales, July 1, 1891.'] 



From time to time we read in the American news of the great 

 ravages played there in forests and towns by tornados, and it is 

 quite evident that we have the same enemy in our land, and the 

 only reason we hear less about it is, that population is so thinly 

 scattered over the inland districts, the home of these storms. 

 From many reports which have reached me, I fear we must admit 

 that they are just as terrible in their destructive powers as those 

 known in America ; when sound growing trees three and even 

 four feet in diameter are snapped off within four feet of the ground, 

 it is evident that they wield a force before which ordinary town 

 buildings would be destroyed as if by magic. Such being the fact, 

 I have been seeking for information, in order that it may be on 

 record when wanted. 



The most complete account has been kindly sent me by Mr. 

 Corbett Lawson, Police Magistrate of Bingara, who obtained the 

 photographs and took a great deal of trouble to follow out the 

 track of the storm to which the following notes apply. 



On 23rd February 1891 there were no very threatening weather 

 conditions; an anticyclone rested over South Australia, a low 

 pressure lay S.E. from Sydney, and a tongue of Equatorial low 



