DISTRICT OF CUMBERLAND AND WESTMORELAND. 
631 
of the Lake District. The increase in the per-centage in the winter months of 1850 is 
doubtless attributable to the fact of the deposition being almost entirely in the form 
of rain, the fall of snow on the mountains having been unusually small both in the 
early and latter months of the past year. 
The most interesting and important circumstance connected with the experiments 
in 1850, is the discovery of a mountain station which promises to yield nearly one- 
third more rain than the celebrated hamlet of Seathwaite in Borrowdale, hitherto, 
and with good reason, considered to be the wettest spot in Great Britain. The new 
station is about a mile and a half distant from Seathwaite in a south-westerly direc- 
tion, and 580 feet above it, or 948 feet above the sea-level, at the extreme southern 
termination of the valley ; it is on the shoulder of Sprinkling Fell or the Stye, about 
100 yards south of the road leading over the Stye Pass to Wastdale. 
The actual quantity of water measured on Sprinkling Fell in eleven months of 
1850, is 174'33 inches; but the receiver was found running over on four different 
occasions, by which I calculate 5 or 6 inches at least must have been lost to the in- 
strument ; hence, if we add 5‘67 inches for overflow, and 9*49 inches for the computed 
depth in January (7‘34 inches at Seathwaite), the result is 189'49 inches for the fall 
on the Stye in 1850, with 143-96 inches at Seathwaite*. 
The wettest year since the commencement of the experiments is 1848, when 160-89 
inches fell at Seathwaite ; and, computing the fall at the new station for that year in 
the same proportion which the two localities bear to each other in 1850, we have 
211-62 inches for the depth of rain on the Stye in 1848. An inspection of the follow- 
ing Table, which exhibits the fall at the coast during the last eighteen years, will 
show that the period (1844-50) over which the Lake District gauges have been in 
operation, has been far from a wet one. 
Fall of Rain at Whitehaven (seventeen miles distant in a direct line from Sea- 
thwaite) during the last Eighteen Years, from 1833 to 1850 inclusive. 
Month. 
1833. 
1834. 
1835. 
1836. 
1837. 
1838. 
1839. 
1840. 
1841. 
1842. 
1843. 
1844. 
1845. 
1846. 
1847. 
1848. 
1849. 
1850. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
in. 
January ... 
•712 
9-169 
4-643 
4-133 
2-824 
1-785 
4-576 
4-586 
3-674 
3-429 
4-875 
4-119 
4541 
4-604 
1-873 
3-745 
5-683 
2-995 
February... 
4-235 
5-303 
7-597 
3-626 
5-278 
-943 
2-768 
4-376 
1-536 
2-657 
•863 
3-499 
2-830 
2-007 
1-827 
7-815 
2-045 
4-836 
March 
2-928 
2-560 
5-751 
5-742 
1-209 
4-474 
6-229 
•396 
3-800 
4-912 
1-927 
3-746 
3-735 
4-460 
1-370 
4-588 
•837 
-939 
April 
2-346 
1-404 
1-367 
2-939 
1-789 
2-355 
1-463 
•580 
3-803 
•551 
6-046 
2-658 
2-587 
2-848 
2-560 
•495 
1-488 
3-113 
May 
2-257 
2-483 
3-964 
-010 
1-148 
3-238 
-843 
3-781 
2-955 
2-293 
2-016 
•262 
1-480 
2-317 
3-428 
1-798 
3-037 
1-329 
June 
6-783 
4-682 
1-601 
6-642 
3-647 
7-125 
4-003 
5-893 
4-512 
1-861 
4-497 
3-878 
4-099 
2-311 
2-912 
3-867 
1-224 
2-012 
July 
4-384 
5-065 
5-451 
7-146 
7-245 
4-893 
5-681 
8-138 
4-569 
3-782 
6-104 
4-183 
2-900 
9-061 
•776 
3-630 
5-478 
5-358 
August . . . 
2-090 
4-755 
1-813 
5-886 
2-157 
5-148 
5-655 
6-175 
7-879 
1-813 
4-875 
1-999 
6-995 
4-066 
4-496 
5-054 
3-771 
4-501 
September. 
2-339 
4-281 
6-507 
6-399 
3-305 
3-289 
6-714 
5-754 
5-670 
2 871 
•390 
5-809 
3-653 
2-857 
3-738 
2-266 
2-814 
2-643 
October ... 
4-240 
3-937 
6-217 
4-049 
5-832 
4-574 
4-209 
2-452 
8-344 
2-388 
6-748 
4-335 
6-744 
7-982 
5-407 
5-772 
5-252 
3-364 
November. 
7-0.94 
2-749 
4-996 
6-150 
4-620 
4-481 
4-048 
4-420 
3-955 
3-702 
5-569 
1-926 
4-022 
4-671 
7-937 
3-507 
4-974 
6-258 
December. 
9 048 
3-315 
4-228 
6-253 
6-278 
1-641 
2-787 
•893 
5-276 
4-434 
2-296 
•309 
5-621 
1-950 
6-597 
4-805 
2-396 
3-095 
Total 
48-456 
49-703 
54-135 
58-975 
45-332 
43-946 
48-976 
47-444 
55-973 
34-693 
46-206 
36-723 
49-207 
49-134 
42-921 
47-342 
38-999 
40-473 
Wet Days. 
203 
200 
215 
230 
1§9 
167 
198 
210 
220 
167 
210 
172 
193 
200 
191 
211 
190 
190 
Average number of wet days, 197. 
* A new and capacious gauge was placed on the Stye early in January of the present year (1851). 
4 M 2 
