Water vapor is always present in the air.
EXPERIMENT NO. 10
Expose a piece of dry potash to the air. You will soon discover that the potash will dissolve. It has taken up water from the air.
EXPERIMENT NO. 11
Put a piece of ice in a pitcher of water and allow it to stand in a warm room. You will soon notice that little beads of perspiration collect on the outside of the pitcher. This moisture is air being condensed.
Water vapor is part of the atmosphere. Some of it is always present in the air. The amount of vapor that the air can hold depends upon the temperature. When the temperature is warm, the air will hold more water. For instance, at 100° F. a cubic foot of air will hold 19.79 grains of vapor; at 80° F., 10.95 grains; at 50° F., 4.09 grains, and 32° F., 2.17 grains. At 32° F. is the freezing point on the Fahrenheit scale.
Air containing as much water vapor as it can hold is saturated. If the air is suddenly cooled down, that is, if the temperature falls when the air is saturated, air molecules are contracted, and it must give up the water, which produces rain. The ocean and the Great Lakes are the source from which the air gets its water. It rises into the air in the form of vapor, that is, vapor rising from the surface of the water, and the wind distributes it over the land. Condensation turns it into clouds, and when it is over-saturated, or rather, when the temperature drops and the air is unable to retain any more water, then it forms into drops of water and falls as rain. When the clouds get into the air, below the freezing point of the water, the drops of water are changed into ice crystals or snow flakes.
When the ice crystals are just at the point of melting into water, due to the rise in temperature, the snowflakes lose their form and the result is sleet.
HOW CAN WE USE THESE FACTS?
So far we have described, in a general way, certain facts about the elements of the air, such as temperature, pressure, humidity, precipitation, evaporation, clouds, winds, etc., and these facts of the elements enter into a very interesting phase of weather observation which we will designate as prophesying without instruments or forecasting by physical science. When we come to the more interesting and scientific part of weather observation, we will drop the word “prophecy,” because the instruments that are used to measure these elements are going to indicate certain things to us that will lead you to more definite conclusions. Hence, the following observations are what have given an opportunity to the weather prophet or to those people who have been credited with some mysterious power to prophesy what the weather is going to be. They are not definite or conclusive, and they cannot always be depended upon, but they certainly are significant and interesting, and a description of weather would not be complete without a list in chronological order of a series of phenomena or physical signs of this character that have lead certain men to gain quite a reputation for prophesying what the weather is going to be.