The Times publishes every morning with the forecasts the weather chart issued by the department. This chart shows the condition and movements of the atmosphere over the British Isles and the vicinity; the distribution of pressure; the temperature, state of the sea, and the force and direction of the winds blowing within the area at six P.M. on the previous day.
The familiar dotted lines termed isobars, which are such a feature in weather maps of this sort, are lines at all places along which the barometer stands at the same height. Except where their regularity is broken by the existence of subsidiary disturbances, these lines extend in gradually widening circles around a centre of depression, the barometer always standing highest along the outside curve, and gradually and regularly falling towards the centre; so that if we could view our atmosphere from above one of those centres of depression, we would see a deep hollow, with sides sloping downwards to the centre, towards which the revolving air was being gradually indrawn, like water in an eddy.
At intervals, we receive warning across the Atlantic, from the New York Herald weather bureau, respecting storms which are crossing the Atlantic towards our coasts, and which are often described as ‘likely to develop dangerous energy’ on their way. Although many of those warnings are subsequently justified, or partially justified, it must not be supposed that these are storms which have left the American continent on their way to us, and that it has been possible to calculate their course across the Atlantic and predict the time of arrival upon our coasts. Mr Clement Ley, Inspector to the Meteorological Council, tells us that it is not yet satisfactorily shown that storms cross the Atlantic from America, and he presumes that arrangements must be effected by which the logs of passing steamers may be consulted in America as to the character of the weather experienced in crossing from this country; and from the information received in this manner, it is possible to arrive at conclusions respecting the direction and character of storms travelling towards this side of the Atlantic, and to anticipate their arrival by telegraph, the warning being flashed beneath the ocean in time to reach us long before the storm itself.
The variety and complexity of the phenomena which have to pass under careful observation render the science of the weather an exceedingly difficult one to study, more especially as, up to the present, we have done little more than master its fundamental principles. The time ought not, however, to be far distant when we shall have the means at our disposal to enable us to forecast the weather with a nearer approach to certainty than we can attain at present. The results already obtained by the Meteorological Office are certainly encouraging, and it must be remembered that, in attempting to forecast the weather in this country, it labours under two serious disadvantages. The first is our geographical position, which at present precludes us from obtaining any but the shortest notice of weather approaching from the west—the point from which most of our weather comes. The other drawback is of a pecuniary nature, and it is to be regretted that it prevents us from testing to the full limit the usefulness of the Meteorological Office. It may be argued that, in this country, storms are seldom so sudden or disastrous as to justify us in maintaining at a very much larger outlay an organisation which would enable us to be warned of their approach. It is, however, only necessary to take into account the enormous losses in life and property occasioned every year by the weather in shipwreck alone, in order to appreciate what might be the value to the nation of a properly organised system of weather science, did it only succeed in reducing, even by a small percentage, the annual number of wrecks on our coasts.
BY MEAD AND STREAM.
BY CHARLES GIBBON.
CHAPTER LIV.—POOR COMFORT.
Madge awakened from the reverie into which she had fallen, to find Aunt Hessy’s kind eyes resting on her inquiringly and with a shade of sorrow in them. She, however, instantly awoke, brightened and spoke with cheerful confidence, although there was a certain note of timidity in her voice indicating that she had not yet quite recovered from the effects of the scene in her bedroom.
‘You see, aunt, how wickedly Philip has been deceived, and that I was right to trust Mr Shield.’
‘Yes, but—Mr Beecham?’