REVIEWS. 
349 
Droughts and Frosts as yet found recorded from a.d. 134 to the 'present Time, 
a title that irresistibly reminds the reader of the black-letter ballads of some 
centuries ago. Both books have one object, the very important one of 
showing how in our very variable climate the weather may be foretold ; 
but the scope, the matter, and the investigations are very different in the 
two cases. In Mr. Lowe’s pamphlet we have information extending over 
centuries, observations collected from all quarters of the globe, the results 
generalized, and a large margin given ; while Mr. Ley’s work contains all 
the minutiae of the science, the small meteorological phenomena of every-day 
life being there noted and explained. Neither work pretends to greater dis- 
tinction than that of being a short sketch of the subjects of which it treats ; 
and in the case of Mr. Lowe’s book, it is avowedly an introduction to a 
more important work which is now in course of preparation. 
The 1 Aids ’ is divided into three distinct parts. It deals first with the 
most important non-instrumental observations to which attention should be 
given by the student of the weather ; secondly, with the relations which 
exist between the winds and the distribution of barometric pressure ; and 
thirdly, with the conditions of weather which attend and characterize 
atmospheric disturbances. 
With the exception of a few words as to 1 backing ’ and 1 veering,’ wind 
observations are shortly dismissed, and the author passes on to the subject 
of Clouds. To this subject he has evidently given his closest attention, and 
it is evident from his remarks that by closely watching the varieties and 
movements of clouds, good guesses as to changes of weather can be made 
even for two or three days in advance. Other weather signs are then 
discussed by the author, and the various proverbs , 1 The observations of the 
many set forth by the wit of one,’ are scientifically explained, and either 
confirmed or refuted. It would, in our opinion, have been preferable had 
this part of the book been very considerably extended ; instead of only 
eight pages out of thirty-eight being devoted to this popular and non- 
instrumental part, it might at least have been expanded into three times the 
space with a corresponding abridgment of Parts II. and III. Part II. deals 
with the relations of pressure and winds, not only in our immediate neigh- 
bourhood, but in all parts of the globe, and very pretty and interesting 
examples of the cyclones and anti-cyclones are given, together with the cir- 
culation of the winds round these centres ; but throughout the whole of this 
part there appears to be a more or less general reproduction of the matter 
which was given to the world in Mr. Scott’s Weather Charts and Storm 
Warnings, and the whole of this division pre-supposes the possession of the 
weather charts, and the time to study them. 
Part III. gives us again a quantity of useful and popular information as 
to changes which may, and do actually take place over our heads ; and at 
the conclusion specimens are given of the sort of forecast which an observer 
can make, even without the aid of the weather-maps , a desideratum which 
cannot be too strongly insisted on. At the conclusion, the author has given 
two maps of the mean atmospheric pressure and prevailing winds for the 
months of January and July, the principal phenomena in which are noted in 
the chapters on those subjects. Speaking about these charts, he says that 
we find areas of low pressure around the poles, but this does not appear to 
