VIII. 
EEPOET ON THE EAINFALL IN HEETFOEDSHIEE IN 1885 . 
By the Bev. C. W. Haevey, M.A., F.B.Met.Soc. 
Read at Hertford , 29 th April , 1886 . 
An Annual Beport upon the Bainfall in our County seems to 
have become a recognised part of the published Transactions of our 
Society. When we turn to page 63 of the first volume of the 
‘Transactions of the Watford Natural History Society,’ we find a 
record of the rainfall for the first three months of the year 1875 at 
three stations ; this is followed on page 112 of the same volume by 
a brief, one-page report, on the rainfall for the whole of the same 
year, giving the fall at four stations in the Lower Colne District, 
and at one in the District of the Bulborne. For the year 1876 Mr. 
Hopkinson published what may be considered the first regular 
report on the rainfall throughout the County, giving the results 
of observations at twenty-two stations. The present report will, 
therefore, form the tenth consecutive one which has been laid before 
the Society, the first four (1876-1879) having been prepared by 
Mr. Hopkinson, the last six (1880-1885) by myself. It may not 
be uninteresting therefore to record the progress during that period, 
as regards the number of stations, and gauges at work, each year: 
Year. 
Stations. 
Gauges. 
Year. 
Stations. 
Gauges. 
1876 
22 
23 
1881 
29 
3i 
1877 
26 
27 
1882 
29 
3i 
1878 
26 
27 
1883 
29 
33 
1879 
27 
28 
1884 
27 
3 i 
1880 
27 
28 
1885 
26 
29 
On the whole these numbers are satisfactory, and show no signs 
of any flagging of interest in this particular branch of meteorology. 
It is true that since 1883 there has been a slight yearly decrease in 
the number of observers, but the decrease does not arise from any 
real loss of interest. Last year it may be remembered I had to record 
the retirement of the Bev. J. 0. Seager, of Stevenage, an observer 
of 15 years’ standing; this year I am sorry to have to record the 
loss, by death, of an observer of nearly 37 years’ standing in the 
person of Mr. W. Squire, of Great Berkhamsted. But the Berk- 
hamsted record has not thus been brought abruptly to an end; 
another observer, well known among meteorologists, has com¬ 
menced observations there during the year, namely Mr. E. Mawley, 
a vice-president of the Boyal Meteorological Society, and the author 
of a well-known annual report on the weather in the neighbourhood 
of London. 
Our Beports, therefore, extending as they now do over a complete 
decade (1876-85), I have thought it well to draw out a fresh set of 
