send Mr. Vennor an addressed envelope and stamps, requesting a forecast of the probable weather during a certain week.

A prominent auctioneer, also of New York City, holds an open air auction in a country part on a certain date, but will change it to another date if Mr. Vennor advises.

An old soldiers' parade being on the tapis, the originator writes to Mr. Vennor to fix the day. The letters from New York and Boston are the most numerous, and are principally from ice companies. Other communications have been received from Greenville, Illinois; Fort Wayne, Indiana; Jerusalem, N.Y.; Northampton, Mass.; Richmond, Pa.; Hudson, N. Y.; Reading, Pa.; Toronto, Ont. ; Cleveland, O., &c., &c., all pertaining to the weather to come.

A Louisville, Kentucky, correspondent mentions the fulfilment of one of Mr. Vennor's forecasts, and asks for an 1880 Almanac, stating that "people now go entirely by your predictions."

The line,

SIGNS OF FOUL WEATHER.

BY DR. JENNER.

The hollow winds begin to blow;
The clouds look Hack, the glass is low;
The soot falls down, the spaniels sleep;
And spiders from their cobwebs peep.
Last night the sun went pale to bed ;
The moon in halos hid her head.
The boding shepherd heaves a sigh,
For, see, a rainbow spans the sky.
The walls are damp, the ditches smell,
Closed is the pink-eyed pimpernel.
Hark! how the chairs and tables crack,*

Old Betty's joints are on the rack :

Her corns with shooting pains torment her,
And to her bed untimely sent her.
Loud quack the ducks, the sea-fowl cry,

The distant hills are looking nigh.

How restless are the snorting swine!
The busy flies disturb the kine.

Hark how the chairs and tables orack," is incorrect; as the cracking, that is, contraction, indicates, fair weather, from the diminution of moisture. —

teinmetz.

Low o'er the grass the swallow wings,
The cricket, too, how sharp he sings!
Puss on the hearth, with velvet paws,
Sits wiping o'er her whiskered jaws.
The smoke from chimneys right ascends,
Then, spreading, back to earth it bends.
The wind unsteady veers around,
Or settling in the south is found.
Through the clear stream the fishes rise,
And nimbly catch the incautious flies.
The glowworms num'rous, clear and bright,
Illumed the dewy hill last night.
At dusk the squalid toad was seen,
Like quadruped stalk o'er the green.
The whirling wind the dust obeys,
And in the rapid eddy plays.
The frog has changed his yellow vest,
And in a russet coat is drest.

The sky is green, the air is still,

The mellow blackbird's voice is shrill.
The dog, so altered in his taste,
Quits mutton-bones, on grass to feast.
Behold the rooks, how odd their flight,
They imitate the gliding kite,
And seem precipitate to fall,
As if they felt the piercing ball.
The tender colts on back do lie,
Nor heed the trav'ler passing by.

In fiery red the sun doth rise,

Then wades through clouds to mount the skies.
'Twill surely rain, we see't with sorrow,

No working in the fields to-morrow.

HEIGHT OF CLOUDS.

The height of a cloud may sometimes be measured in the same manner as the height of any other inaccessible object, by simultaneous observations of its direction at two stations. More satisfactory results may, however, be obtained by ascending in a balloon, and noting the height of the barometer at the instant of entering a cloud, and again

when emerging from it; the barometer affording the means of computing the corresponding altitudes. In mountainous countries we may sometimes determine the height of a cloud by comparing it with some peak of known elevation near which the cloud is carried by the wind.

The height of clouds is very variable, and their mean elevation is not the same in different countries. The stratus cloud often descends to the earth's surface. In leasant weather, the lower limit of cumulus clouds varies from 3,000 to 5,000 feet elevation, and their upper limit from 5,000 to 12,000 feet. Cirrus clouds are never seen below the summit of Mount Blanc, which has an elevation of 15,744 feet.

Clouds are sometimes seen above the summit of Chimborazo, which has an elevation of 21,424 feet. Gay-Lussac and Glaisher, in their different balloon ascents to the height of 23,000 feet, saw cirrus clouds which appeared considerably above them. It is estimated that the greatest height at which visible clouds ever exist does not exceed ten miles.

CAN MAN ALTER THE WEATHER?

Sir John Herschel reasons out the subject thus conclusively in an article in Good Words of 1864

"Is it in any degree within the power of man to alter the weather? A strange question, it may seem at first sight, to propose; but by no means so absurd a one as it may appear. The total rainfall, and, which is perhaps as regards weather and climate of even more importance, the frequency of showers on an extensive well-wooded tract, or one entirely covered by forests, ought, on every theoretical view of the causes which determine rain, to be greater than on the same tract denuded of trees. The foliage of trees defends the soil beneath and around them from the sun's direct rays, and disperses their heat in the air, to be carried away by winds, and thus prevents the ground from becoming heated in the summer; while, on the other hand, a heated surface-soil reacts by its radiation on the clouds as they pass over it, and thus prevents many a refreshing shower, which they would otherwise deposit, or disperses them altogether. So again of drainage

by carrying away rapidly the surface water down to the rivulet, and so hurrying it away to the ocean, it not only cuts off a great deal of the supply of local evaporation, which is a material element in the amount

of rainfall, but by causing the surface to dry more rapidly under the sun's influence, it allows it also to become more heated, and so to conspire with the action of the denudation of trees to prevent rain. Evidence is not wanting to corroborate this à priori view of the matter. The rainfall over large regions of North America is said to be gradually diminishing, and the climate otherwise altering, in consequence of the clearance of the forests; while, on the other hand, under the beneficent influence of a largely increased cultivation of the palm in Egypt, rain is annually becoming more frequent. Lakes are cited in what was formerly Spanish America (that of Nicaragua, if we mistake not is one), whose water supply (derived of course from atmospheric sources) had been so diminished, owing to the denudation of the country under the Spanish régime, as to contract their area and leave large tracts of their shores dry; which, now that the vegetation is again restored, are once more covered by their waters. Even in our own southern counties complaints are beginning to be heard of a diminution of water supply, partly, it is said, owing to gradually decreasing rainfall from the universal clearance of timber, though chiefly perhaps attributable to robbing the springs of their supply by draining-a practice beneficial no doubt to agriculture, if used with caution and in moderation, but of which the consequences if carried to excess may ere long be severely felt, in rendering large tracts of country uninhabitable in summer from mere want of water."

METEORS AND AEROLITES.

A comparison of all the facts which are known respecting shootingstars, detonating meteors and aerolites leads to the conclusion that they are all minute bodies revolving like the comets in orbits about the sun, and are encountered by the earth in its orbital motion. The visible path of aerolites is somewhat nearer to the earth's surface than that of ordinary shooting-stars, result which may be ascribed to their greater density, which causes, therefore, greater resistance.

These three classes of bodies exhibit alternate periods of maximum and minimum abundance, and the times of maximum for the several classes correspond somewhat with each other, indicating that these bodies are collected in groups, and the three classes of bodies are grouped in a somewhat similar manner, The August meteors move in orbits which require more than a century to complete, and comprehend bodies differing greatly in size and probably also in density. Their

magnitudes range from comets whose diameter is perhaps 100,000 miles to minute atoms which, in a single second, are dissipated by the heat resulting from their collision with our atmosphere. Their density ranges from that of metallic iron to earthy bodies having but feeble cohesion, which are dissipated into fine dust by the heat of collision with our atmosphere; and it is possible that the rarest of them may consist of solid or liquid matter in a state of minute subdivision, like a cloud of dust or smoke.

The periodic meteors of November probably comprehend bodies having an equal range of magnitude, and perhaps also of density.— Loomis.

THE LUNAR WEATHER THEORY.

The general principles of the lunar theory as to the weather are thus stated by Claudius Ptolemy, as quoted by Mr. A. J. Pearce in his "Weather Guide-Book," according to Astro-Meteorology :

"The moon's course is to be carefully observed at the third day before or after her conjunction with the sun (new moon), her opposition (full moon), and her intermediate quarters; for if she then shine thin and clear, with no other phenomena about her, she indicates serenity but if she appears thin and red, and have her whole illuminated part visible, and in a state of vibration, she portends winds from the quarter of her latitude and declination :* and if she appear dark or pale and thick, she threatens storms and showers. All halos formed around the moon should also be observed, for if there appears one only, bright and clear, and decaying by degrees, it promises serene weather; but if two or three appear, tempests are indicated; and if they seem reddish and broken they threaten tempests, with violent and boisterous winds; if dark and thick they foreshow storms and snow; if pale, or black and broken, tempests with winds and snow, both; and whenever a great number appear, storms of greater fury are portended."

Sir John Herschel comments as follows on the theory

"Lunar prognostics about the weather may be classed under three several heads, namely ::-1. Simple connotations of the appearance of