216 MONTHLY WEATHER REVIEW. MAY, 1898
statione, in noways represents tbe true conditione on the lake surfaces during windy weather. The lake surface is increased to a considerable extent by wave action and the contact with constantly changing a i r and spray blown from waves make conditione which almost render the problem indeterminate. .
Mr. Wiener adds:
The run off above given is that which, from a personal knowledge of the country, seems reasonable to me. T,he discharge of the St. Marys, 72,600, is, I think, very near1 correct. J!he discharge of the St. Clair River for mean conditions Joe8 not, in m opinion, exceed 200,OOO cubic feet per second. I n this connection P wish to call attention to the fact that the dischar e of Lake Huron depends on both the stage i n Lake Huron and i n f a k e St. Clair. Owing to t h e fluctuation of Lake Erie being greater than for Lake Huron, the minimum slope of the St. Clair River occurs a t the high stage of the lakes, and the maxi- mum slope a t the minimum stage, a condition which has not been heretofore considered, and which pla s an important art in the tluctu- ations of both lakes. The 8t. Clair d v e r is only 758 feet wide at its head, and a large part of any change of slope is concentrated in the rapid at the foot of Lake Huron, which simply means that the maxi- mum discharge is not necessarily at the maximum stage of Lake Huron. We are now making additional observations for t h e discharge of Niagara River at a higher stage than when observations were made last fall, which ma change the result obtained then. I feel quite c o d d e n t now that t h e discharge for mean stage will likely fall between 230,000 and 240,OOO cubic feet.
- OCEANIC AND SEISMIC NOISES.
The following extract from the English journal, Nature,
for June 9, 1898, Vol. LVIII, page 130, is of interest in
connection with the article on page 152 of the MONTHLY
WEATHER REVIEW for April which was published almost
simultaneously, and without knowledge of the Italian article
referred to by our contemporary:
The mysterious phenomenon known as  Barisal guns, or  Mist poeffers, forms the subject of a useful paper by Dr. A. Cancani, in the last Bollettino, Vol. 111, No. 9, of the Italian Seismological Society. The observations on which his discussion is founded are collected from laces i n or near the inland province of Umbria, where t h e noises are inown as marina, i t being the popular belief that they come from the sea. The sound is quite distinct and easily recognized; it is longer than that of a cannon shot, and though more prolonged and dull, i t is not unlike distant thunder. It invariably seems to come from a dis- tance, and from the neighborhood of the horizon, sometimes appar- ently from the ground, but generally through the air. The weather, when t h e  marina is heard, is calm as a rule, but that it often pre- cedes bad weather is shown by the common saging, Cuando tuona la marina o acqualo vento o strina (when the ocean thunders, expect rain or wind or heat). The interval between successive detonations is very variable, sometimes being only a few minutes or even seconds. They appear to be heard at all times of the day and year, the expe- rience of observers differing widely as to the epochs whez they are heard most frequently. marina, Dr. Cancani concludes that they can not be due to a stormy sea, because mist-poeffers me frequently observed when the sea is calm; not to gusts of wind i n mountain gorges, for they are heard on mountain summits and i n open plains. If their origin were atmospheric they would not be confined to special regions. Nor can they be connected with artificial noises, for they are heard by night as well as by day, and in countries where the use of explosives areunknown. There remains thus the hypothesis which Dr. Cancani contliders the most robable, that of an endogenous origin. To the obvious obections tgat there should always be a center of maximum intensity, wiich is never to be found, and that they are so rarely accompanied by any perce ltible tremor, he repliee that, in a seismic series, noises are frequently heard without any shock being felt, and of which we are unable to deter- mine the center.
With regard to the origin of the
ELECTRICAL STORMS IN KANSAS.
Mr. T. B. Jennings, Section Director of the Kansas Section
of the Climate a i d Crop Service. reports that-
The western counties of that State are occasionally swept by a wind- storm, denominated by t h e plainsmen as an  Electrical storm, though no thunder or lightning occurs and the weather is generally clear ; i t is a broad wind, blowing with great force ; a person exposed to it soon becomes filled with electricity, and on approaching a stove electric sparks will pass from his hands to the stove; the housewife wraps her hands up in rags to handle t h e stove utensils. It is difficult to realize the conditions in such a windstorm until one experiences them ; t h e electrical conditions are not uniform but confined more to currents or streaks; growing grain and foliage on trees exposed to
these conditione become more or lees scorched, and Bometimes the grain cro ie corn letely killed. Such winds (electric storm) are most frequent$ from t i e northwest.
The mountains of Colorado, and doubtless other parts of
the country, frequently experience electrical storms that
appear to be very similar to those described by Mr. Jennings.
The mind blows severely from the west ; the air is sometimes
quite dry but more often filled with the finest forms of vapor
condensation ; a steady stream of electrical discharges flows
from every sharp point, whether of rock, or plant, or dwell-
ing; the observer feels a tingling and cooling sensation,
precisely similar to that experienced when taking an elec-
trical hath treatment, and hears the singing due to the
thousands of discharges going on all around him. Occs-
sionally our observers on Pikes Peak have had too intense
an experience ; flashee and balls of lightning have played all
around them within the observing station and the iron stove
has heen ablaze with continuous electrical discharges, yet
nothing serious occurred. On a neighboring summit the
field party sent out by the Coast and Geodetic Surveyl in
1593, (1 ) reported far more serious storms of several hours
duration on successive days, entirely preventing work and
injuring the instruments.
It is not yet satisfactorily ascertained whether the electricity
of such storms originates in the earth or in the atmosphere or
in the space beyond. If the latter, then we niay trace i t to
the sun ; if it comes from the air, we must attribute the origin
of the electricity to some peculiarity in the processes of evap-
oration and condensation ; if i t conies from the earth, then i t
must originate in the conipressioiis and shocks and friction
that attend earthquakes and the outflow of lava. We do not
see our way clear to indorse the popular idea that the elec-
tricity is generated by the wind or by the friction of particles
rolled along by the wind, or by the nielting of snow crystals,
as suggested by Mr.Couch. I n fact, the problem is evidently
too difficult for our present limited knowledge.
The first step to be taken in investigating the true nature
of these electric stornis must consist in a collection of data
showing the places and dates of their occurrence, and the col-
lection niust be sufficiently exhaustive to show when and
where they do not occur as well as where they do. It is also
necessary to distinguish between the injury done to plants by
electricity and that done by the drought and the evaporation
that accompany hot, dry winds in Kansas and the western
plains. Reports of the occurrence of these storms will be
very acceptable. A graphic account of the storm of October
27, 1894, is given on p. 120, American Meteorological Journal,
Vol. XII, August, 1895.
METEOROLOGICAL SUPERSTITIONS.
The tendelicy of mankind to regard any unusual meteoro-
logical phenomenoii as a special message from on high,
announcing the speedy occurrence of some event of impor-
tance either to the individual or to the whole human race, is
well illustrated by a note in the April report of Mr. Earl
Flint, a t Rivas, Yicaragua. With reference to the halo re-
corded by him on April 26, he says: Many called my atten-
tion to the halo as they saw three extra suns. Last year for
a similar occurreiice a t St. George the town was called out,
believing i t a foreriinner of some calamity ; hut here a t Rivas,
they made i t the precursor of the earthquake.
An inclosed slip from the Managua Daily gives a long series
of connections between halos and both good and had events
in the history of the world. Of course, any one familiar with
chronological tahles could pick out a thousand more such
coincidences without demonstrating any connection between
halos and the history of the human race further than the
general principle that remarkable events are continually
occurring both in the heavens and on the earth, and that an