G ENETtAL REPORT ON THE RESIDENCY OP SINGAPORE. 628 
Dr Little concludes liis remarks by stating the mean annual solar 
radiation to be 121° 50, the mean terrestrial 66° 10 and the 
hourly mean reading of the Barometer 29.884 inches which never 
varies more than the 20th of an inch. 
Thunder showers frequently occur, particularly at the breaking up 
of the monsoons. That interesting and wonderful atmospherical 
phenomenon, called a water spout, is often to be seen in the seas 
and straits adjacent; they would more properly be called whirl¬ 
winds charged with vapour. They occur generally in the morning 
between 8 and 12 o’clock, and rise to the height of \ a mile, in the 
distance appearing like large columns supporting the heavy masses 
of Cumuli above them. I noticed in October 1841 six of these 
attached to one cloud, under action at tie same time. In August 
1838 one passed over the harbour end town of Singapore, dismasting 
one ship and sinking another, and cany mg off the corner of the 
roof of a house in its passage landward. No other atmospherical 
disturbances of any moment occur. The typhoons of the China 
Sea or Bay of Bengal, do not reach tluse parts, nor are there hot 
winds to parch the land. The equaMe and quiet state of the 
atmosphere and seasons of these regions consequently create analog¬ 
ous properties in the face of indiginois vegetation, evergreens 
abound, few trees shed all their leaves at one time, and many of 
the fruit trees produce all the year round } such that have their 
seasons of fruit will frequently produce crops out of season, having 
small irregular ones at intervening times. This continual verdure 
is perhaps more grateful to the eye olthe stranger than to those 
who have been long accustomed to it; to the former it bears the 
pleasant appearance of exuberance and fecundity, where the lofty 
forest not only hangs over the beach but clothes the mountains to 
their tops, so unlike the sterile bareness of higher latitudes—while to 
the other the continued sameness palls the senses, which lack variety 
and call for a sterile winter only that they may renew, with doubly 
keen perception by the contrast, their acquaintance with the beauties 
of returning summer that here always reigns. 
(To be continued) 
