57o 
Weather -Wisdom and the Harvest. 
[OClober, 
These returns extend over the thirty-two years from 1771 to 
1803, and present a dismal picture. One summer only is 
pronounced “ fine,” and two “ moderately fine,” but with 
the drawback of a cold July. We see therefore that the 
probability of a season cold, wet, or both, during the months 
of June, July, and August, is something like ten to one. It 
must not be understood that in the twenty-nine years the 
whole of the summer was bad. Sometimes a fine June and 
July favoured the haymakers, and were then succeeded by a 
wet August and September, to the ruin of the wheat and the 
barley. Sometimes the case was inverted. But, we repeat, 
the probability of a preponderance of warm, dry weather 
from the beginning of hay-time to the end of the wheat- 
harvest is about as one to ten ! The amount of damage 
varies of course greatly. It may in a moderate season not 
exceed a couple of millions sterling. In such a year as 1879 
it is doubtful if sixty millions would cover the loss. This, 
we submit, is a matter of the deepest national concern. 
Should we not be profuse in our gratitude to a statesman 
who could contrive to reduce the national expenditure by 
even the smaller of these two sums ? We are aware that 
certain hasty — not to say careless — observers are given to 
pooh-pooh the agricultural prosperity of the home kingdoms. 
“ If our own harvest fails,” say they, “ we can import corn 
from abroad.” But as more than half of the national capi- 
tal is invested in agriculture it is surely of importance to us 
all if this capital, instead of bringing in a fair return, is 
diminished by yearly losses. That for the last few seasons 
this must have been the case appears but too clearly. We 
have all, therefore, to ask most earnestly whether there is no 
means of stopping this drain on national resources ? One 
part of the mischief is, speaking in accordance with the 
present state of human knowledge, irremediable. We can- 
not secure calm, sunny weather while the wheat is in bloom ; 
we cannot turn on hot weather to secure thorough and early 
ripening ; nor can we banish the storms which lay both hay 
and corn prostrate. But over the last and most critical 
point in the career of our crops we have — thanks to a modern 
invention — an almost perfedl power. In fadt, to be practi- 
cally independent of the effects of rainy weather during hay- 
time and harvest is now entirely within our own option. 
For a better understanding of the case we must ask the 
reader to accompany us to a meadow about the end of June. 
When the grass has reached full maturity it is cut, and 
then — if there has been overhead a bright sun in a “ glorious 
midsummer sky,” the dew-point well below the temperature, 
