384 



The Great Wiltshire Storm. 



hail of this character probably has given rise to the idea, that has 

 sometimes prevailed, that ice had fallen from the clouds, as if the 

 water had frozen in sheets and then broken up into angular pieces. 

 Others have described them as wedges three inches long, tapering 

 to a point at one end, but heavily weighted with a massive lump at 

 the base : this was where it was raining at the time ; and Mr. Rowell 

 considers that this form resulted from the fall of some of the 

 wedge-shaped stones precipitated through the lower clouds and 

 becoming increased in size by the accumulation of vapours frozen 

 on their larger and heavier ends. At Yatesbury again, the hail- 

 stones were of an entirely different shape, for they had now lost 

 their wedge-like character, and resembled rough irregular stones 

 of about two inches in diameter, and this form may perhaps have 

 been produced by their being whirled about and retarded in their 

 fall, when the storm was at its greatest violence. At Cherhill 

 there was little or no hail, but to the north on the hill above, they 

 fell freely, and I have a graphic description of their shape from 

 Mr. Neate's shepherd, who likened them to the middle of a waggon 

 wheel, with the spokes all broken off. At Monkton no hail was 

 seen, though there was an abundance of rain, but at Berwick Bas- 

 sett, within little more than half-a-mile of Monkton northwards, 

 the hail- stones fell in large quantities, and for their enormous size 

 I am happy to be able to adduce the testimony of the Rev. R. Mead 

 and Mr. Yiveash, who measured some and found them to be 4J 

 inches, and others again, measured accurately with compasses, 

 proved to be no less than 5J inches, and some even to have ex- 

 ceeded 6 inches in circumference, with a diameter of half an inch. 

 This is undoubtedly a very extraordinary size for English hail- 

 stones, though we shall cease to marvel at them so much when we 

 come to read the account of hail in tropical regions, as detailed be- 

 fore the British Association in 1850 and 1855 by Colonel Sykes in 

 his communication "on Indian Hailstorms." There we are told on 

 the best authority, that the hail-stones, which fall in India, in the 

 great majority of cases, exceed the size of filberts; but that occa- 

 sionally they are as large as pullets' eggs, oranges, and even cocoa 

 nuts and pumpkins; that two pounds have been given as the actual 



