78 Swi-spottery . [February, 
photosphere, and it must remain a standing marvel that 
philosophers should have remained so long without seizing 
the proper clue to unravel the many mysteries that surround 
us. Nor is the observation of spots on the sun’s photosphere 
any new thing, There is the ancient Chinese record pur- 
porting to refer to these very spots, and various scattered 
notices coming to us from the Middle Ages. But these 
records, if they possess any precision, are involved, and ap- 
parently unsuitable to convey a just conception of the solar 
cycle : a glance over them reveals at once that any system 
deduced from them is not in accordance with the normal 
eleven-year periodicity of the sun-spots, — in this case the 
only criterion. The application of the lens to the telescope 
in Galileo’s time caused the sun-spots to become a subject 
of more exadf scrutiny, and from this period until the days 
of the elder Herschel they became a subject of comment in 
astronomical circles, and, as might appear, did not wholly 
escape the notice of the fair sex, who patched their faces to 
imitate the sun. To Herschel belongs the credit of pro- 
pounding the question whether these solar changes did not 
affedt the recurrent seasons, and consequently influence the 
corn harvest in our planet ; but his investigations of this 
subject would appear to have been somewhat premature. 
The labours of the indefatigable Schwabe, in daily chroni- 
cling the number of spots on the sun’s face, have more 
lately been supplemented by photographic observations, and 
the result is that these spots have been observed to come 
and go, their maximum of prevalence being attained nor- 
. mally every eleven years. 
It is important, then, to inquire if there be any natural 
phenomena that reappear on our planet in cycles of eleven 
years which may be referred to the influence of these sun- 
. spots. We find, for example, that the time of sun-spots 
has been shown to coincide with a period of cyclones and 
hurricanes, a period of greatest rainfall, and a period of 
eledtric storms ; and, on the other hand, that the time of no 
sun-spots coincides with a period of deficient rainfall and 
tropical drought. All this is of the first commercial im- 
portance. When storms increase shipwrecks become nume- 
rous, and a general depression ensues in certain industries, 
while an augmentation of the rainfall decidedly means a 
deficient harvest in this country, — witness the cry of distress 
that arose in 1879 from our agricultural districts. When 
tropical drought arrives famines are prevalent, and heat and 
inserts conspire to injure cargoes of imported grain ; locusts 
make organised inroads on the standing corn lands. None 
