"Yes, indeed," the Forecaster answered. "There are two hundred official stations scattered all over the United States and the West Indies, each one carefully selected because its site is a key station to weather changes. Twice a day, exactly at eight o'clock in the morning and eight o'clock in the evening, the observations are taken at each station."
"And have they all got rain gauges like mine?" asked Anton.
"Yes, all of them."
"And wind-measurers, like my anemometer?" queried Tom.
"Yes," the Forecaster agreed with a smile, "and some of them have devices that make a continuous record of wind velocity."
"And barometers like mine?" put in one of the younger boys, not to be outdone.
"Various forms of barometers, and barographs, and thermographs, and sunshine recorders and all sorts of things. Some of them even have seismographs, which tell of every tiny little earthquake, that may be going on all over the world. You know, boys, there's hardly an hour of the day that there isn't a small earthquake, somewhere, and there are really quite sizeable earthquakes at least once a month. A well-equipped weather office is quite a complicated affair, and it takes well-trained men to conduct the observations and interpret them properly."
"All those observations are sent to Washington, aren't they, sir?" queried Anton. "Just as I send mine every night to Bob, for him to transmit by wireless."
"Just the same way," the Forecaster answered, "except that they're all sent in cipher, of course. Once in a while the cipher results in some queer combinations. The regular routine requires that an observer send the temperature, the barometric pressure of the atmosphere, the amount of rain or snow, the direction and force of the wind, the state of the weather, the types of clouds and the highest and lowest temperature since the last observation. I remember once, while at the Milwaukee station, we got the following message from La Crosse, Wisconsin:
"'Cross All My Ink Frozen'