The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1887-08-20 00:00:00

THE LONG DROUGHT.

Mt present year, made historically memor-
able by the Royal Jubilee, will also be rend-
ered meteorologically memorable by the long
dr ;tight which has formed an unusal ex-
perience in this changeable climate. It was
no doubt desirable that during the progress
of the celebrations we should have many
days of brilliant sunshine and cloudless skies,
but the drought still continued in most parts
of the country when the public loyal rejoic
ings were things of the past. June, which
soon grew ashamed of moping, as May had
done, shone resplendently at the time of the
mid-summer solstice; July excelled June in
dryness and heat, and August followed in the
same fervid vein, only shewing some signs
of relenting in the northern shires on the
very day when sportsmen strode eagerly
forth to bag the first grouse of the season on
the heath-clad mountain moors. So pro-
longed a drought had its erims aspects for
plenty of other people besides farmers,
though the outlook for the latter was grave '
when the want of rain caused a dearth of
fodder, and the fields were seen whitening
tithe harvest with Vl° grain crops short in
straw and light in the ear. The drought
had only lasted two or three weeks when
fears of water-famine prevailed in some
towns and rurel districts, and the authorities
of Swansea were among the firs. to feel
alarm at the threatened failure in the supply
of what, next to the air we breathe, is a
necessary of life. As weeks wore on with-
out the much-needed refreshing and replen-
ishing falls of rain taking place, the water
famine dread extended far and wide, and
I excited serious apprehensions in some of the
most populous manufacturing towns of
Lancashire and Yorkshire. aranchester did
not succeed in her application to Parliament
several years ago for powers to draw her
water supply from Lake Thirlmeee in West-
moreland, and there is always the danger of
the reservoirs at her command getting ex-
hausted when a drought is of long continu-
ance. Bradford is in Much the sane:, posi-
tion as Manchester, and has cause to fear
the advent of dry weather which parches
the soil. Water is required for other pur-
poses besides nourishment for man and beast
and vs hen the supply grows scanty it be-
comes necessery in some localiies to stop
public works, thus throwing multitudes out
of employment. Thousands of Welsh work-
men underwent this painful experience to-
wards the end of last week, the failure of
water-power in Merionethshire and Carmar-
thenshire
.rendering it impossible to continue
operations at the slate quarries until there
was a downfall of rain to replenish the
streams and the brooks. On a recent oc-
casion water could not be procured to ex-
tineuish a fire which had taken hold of farm
buildings neer Bolton, and they were ac-
cordingly burnt to the ground. From this
circumstance it becames possible to imagine
the fearful destruction that mieht be wrought
by the outbreak of a conflagration in any
large town in which there was but a seanty
water supply. If the Metropolitan Fire
Brigade had been unable, from this melee,
t) cope with the into tremendous outbreak at
Whiteley's mammoth establishment, Bays.
water might have proved the scene of a con-
flagration more destructive than any that
had taken place since the great fire of Lon-
don in the reign of Charles 11. In a dry
season like the present one, rural districts,
no less than towns, run exceptional risks
from outbreaks of fire. Locomotives, with
or without trains in their wake, careering
ac oss the country, are runaway incendiaries,
setting fire, by showers of sparks or red-hot
cinders, to the brown matted °°Tess on the
embankments, which transmit the feeling
flames to adjoining copses, commons, plant-
ations, and even to (fields of ripened grain
ready for the reaping machine or the sweep-
ing stroke of the sharp-edged scythe. Origin-
ating in this way, or in the carelessness of
smokers throwing lighted matches, exten-
sive fires ranging over thousands of acres
have occurred during the course of the season
in Wales, the Highlands of Perthshire, and
in the counties of York, Bedford, and North-
umberland. In America, owing to the in-
tensity of the long-continued tropical heat,
and the consequent tinder-like dryness of
everything under the scorching sun, de-
structive forest-fires, on a vast scale, have
taken place in Michigan and other Western
States, burning many of the settlers out of
house and hold, and also causing loss of life.
On both sides of the Atlantic the rarity of
the thuuderstormS, notwithstanding the
high temperature, has attracted special at-
tention as one of the most singular charac-
teristics of a remakable season. In our own
country the ordinary experience is for hot
weather. after lasting two or three days, to
pass into a state of sultriness that engeu.iers
electrical disturbance:. culminating in
thunder and lightu;ng and heavy downpours
of rain, which ee:nerelly have a cooling, evc n
chilling, ell :et upon the atmosphere. But
in the summer of this ,yeat the ordinary eY-
perier.ce has not I.);,en realised. On many oc-
casions since the begin ing of the droueht
dark clouds h vire overspread the lie ovens in
a business-like manner, as if they meint to
improve the coudition of Cae cereal and root
crops, to give fresh supplies of water to
iaintl: -babbling brooks, and to revive te
garden flowers, prematurely drooping on
their stems as if striken by s-n-ne fatal blight
But the clouds mysteriously rolled away
without fulfilling their promise of pouring
down upon the thirsty- earth relreslin,
showers, and were as useless as the white
fleecy vapours that seem to melt while you
gaze at them in the blue of the noontide
They \sere clouds without rain, though dark
in hue, and only served as a shade when the
sun was shining in his strength. At length,
however, the—break-up of summer seems to
be at hand ; for we have low barometrical
readings and copious rainfall almost every-
where.