DISTRICT OF CUMBERLAND AND WESTMORELAND. 
85 
At Seathwaite there liave been thirty-two days wherein the quantity of rain was be- 
tween 1 and 2 inches, five days between 2 and 3 inches, five days between 3 and 4 
inches, one day between 4 and 5 inches, and one day between 5 and 6 inches. At 
Langdale Head there have been thirty days of the first, three days of the second, and 
five days of the third class (3 to 4 inches). 
There was hail in the lake districts on the 8th of June and on the 25th of July. 
The last traces of snow disappeared from the mountains on the 1st of June, and the 
first appearance of hoar frost was on the 27th of September. 
I purposely postpone any remarks on the temperature of the lake districts till the 
next report, when I hope to make some extensive comparisons with other and widely 
different localities. The temperature of these valleys is much higher than is com- 
monly imagined. The observations both in 1846 and 1847 were taken with great 
care, and I have no doubt of their correctness. The radiation from the earth is 
much greater in summer than at the coast ; but in winter it appears to be so ex- 
ceedingly small, that I have thought it best to omit the results for those months in 
the table till future observations have proved their accuracy or otherwise. 
The Mountain Gauges. 
The mountain gauges are on pretty much the same construction as those in the 
valleys, but the receivers are much more capacious, being calculated to hold nearly 
80 inches of water. These gauges are, with one exception, stationed on the high 
mountains surrounding the vale of Wastdale. 
Sea Fell, the highest mountain in England, stands on the south, and Great Gable 
on the north side of the valley. The gauge above Stye Head Tarn is on the shoulder 
of the Gable at the eastern extremity of the vale : Sparkling Tarn is about 600 feet 
above the top of Stye Head Pass, in a southerly direction, and 1260 feet higher, bear- 
ing south-west, are Sea Fell Pikes. 
The bearings of the several stations from the gauge at Wastdale Head are as fol- 
low: — Sea Fell, S.; Gable, N.N.E. ; Stye Head, N.E. ; Sparkling Tarn, E. by N.; and 
Seatollar Common in Borrowdale, N.E., distant four and a half miles in a direct line. 
The gauges on Sea Fell, Gable and Seatollar, are on the extreme summits of these 
mountains, and the whole of the instruments are freely exposed to the action of wind 
and rain from almost every point of the compass. 
Appended to the tables for 1846 I find the following remark : — “It would be pre- 
mature, from the scanty data before me, to draw any decided inference as to the gra- 
dation in the quantity of rain at these great elevations above the sea. But it seems 
probable that in mountainous districts the amount of rain increases from the valley 
upwards, to an altitude of about 2000 feet, where it reaches a maximum ; and 
that above this elevation it rapidly decreases.” The Table for 1846 exhibited the 
rain-fall of the summer months only, but the additional returns of 1847, obtained in 
every variety of season, confirm the above deductions in every essential particular. 
