THE ARID REGION. 



359 



in the higher one (58° 45 / ). Between these latitudes 

 is a region of calm or of variable winds ; and there can 

 be no doubt that the north-easterly current materially 

 affects the humidity of the climate of Eupert's Land north 

 of the 50th parallel. The prevalence of north and north- 

 easterly winds during the winter months occasions a great 

 precipitation of snow throughout the humid region. In 

 the Touchwood Hill range, snow not unfrequently accu- 

 mulates ' in the woods, where it is undisturbed by winds, 

 to the depth of two feet ; on the Biding and Duck Moun- 

 tain the precipitation is also large, and throughout the 

 humid region very much in excess of the precipitation in 

 lower latitudes.* 



Forty-eight inches of rain and thirty-nine inches of 

 snow were registered by Mr. Gunn near the Stone 

 Fort, Eed Eiver, between June 1st, 1855, and May 31st, 

 1856. The precipitation at Toronto during the same 

 period was thirty inches of rain and seventy-two of snow, 

 giving an excess of humidity to the climate of the Eed 

 Eiver Settlements, when compared with Toronto, which is 

 represented by fourteen inches, a quantity exceeding the 

 annual precipitation over the greater portion of the eastern 

 flank of the Eocky Mountains south of the great Missouri 

 bend. 



The arid region, or Great Plains, west of the 101st 

 degree of longitude, receive a very small amount of pre- 

 cipitation from the humid south winds coming up the 

 Valley of the Mississippi from the Gulf of Mexico. It is 

 too far south to be much affected by north-east winds, or 

 the westerly winds from the Pacific. This vast treeless 

 prairie forms, in fact, the northern limit of the great arid 

 region of the eastern flank of the Eocky Mountains ; but 



* Compare Lorin Blodgot's Rain Charts. 



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