The New York herald., 1870-06-07
Storms, Floods and Droughts-Remarkable
NIeteOrOlOgical Events.

Meteorological Events.
With the details of the heaviest rains and
most destructive foods, in March last, ever
experienced in Australia since the occupation
of that continental island by the Anglo-Saxon,
we have the news of q five days storm OF
,, snow, hail and rain last week in the Rocky
Mountain Territory of Montana, and various
reports of drought and its disastrous cOnse-
quences Of blighted crops and burning forests,
from Maine westward to the Winnipeg basin,
including Northern New York and nearly the
whole of the New Dominion. Several weeks
ago we had reports of an alarming drought
throughout the State of California, and thence
extending northward into Oregon; but subse-
quenty the apprehensions Of general disas-
ter to the suffering farmers were materially
lightened by refreshing rains. Meantime,
from the latitude of New York city southwark,
we have no complaints of drought from the in
terror or the seaboard, except from Long
Island, where the farmers are complaining Of
short supplies of rain, and where heavy losses
| from fires in the woods have resulted from an
unusually dry season.
| Since the advent Of spring, too, the volcanic
regions of Mexico and Central America have
been in high state of combustion, and earth
| quakes from time to time have turned into the
| streets, at moments warning, the whole
! population of San Francisco. Down in Texas
| they appear to have had a mixture Of dry
| weather, hail storms and water spouts while
| in several of our Northwestern States, from
| Illinois to Minnesota, they have had already
number of very respectable tornadoes. What
conclusions can we reach from all these things
| Taking the late destructive floods in Australia
! in connection with the recent terrific hurricane
and inundation at Buenos Ayres, it would ap-
pear that while unusually heavy storms (au-
! tumnaD have swept around the globe on the
south side of the equator, the season (spring)
on the north side, with some exceptional
storms, has been comparatively dry. From
this we may conclude that when one half Of
| the earth suffers from an excess of rain, the
other half suffers from deficiency, the gene
| raj evaporation from the sea by the sun being
from year to year the same.
But why these great fluctuations in any
| locality between excessive drought and exces-
sve rains in any one season as compared with
| another? Various causes operate to produce
these local differences. The general causes
operating upon the rain fall of different coun-
tries are the movements of the globe on it's
axis and in its orbit, the prevailing currents of
| the atmosphere and the great currents of the
ocean, warm and cold, the confguration of the
continents and the island groups of the
several oceans, the moon and its changing
phases the movements Of the tides as affected
thereby, the great mountain ranges of the con-
tinents and islands, and the great deserts of
Asia, Africa and America; for these rainless
deserts play very conspicuous part in water
ing the fruitful portions of the earth. The
| great rainy zone, extending some fifteen
degrees or more each side, is that of the
| equator, because around the line of the
! equator the evaporation from the sea is the
greatest. Mountain ranges and forests are
the condensers of this vapor, and the deserts,
in creating vacuum with their heated and
| rariied air, draw towards them the denser air
with its moisture from the sea, to be dis
charged among the woods, plains and noun
| tains on the way.
The most important local causes affecting
the rain fall in any quarter are the prevailing
| winds and the ocean currents and if for the
last month or two the prevailing winds from
the latitude of this city northward into
Canada have been carrying their moisture
from the Atlantic to be discharged among the
pine forests of the tablelands and lakes of
Minnesota, where the Mississippi has it's
sources, and thousand miles westward OF
Minnesota, among the Rocky Mountains in
Montana, where the Missouri has its sources,
we may reasonably expect very soon reac-
ton which will water all the intervening coun-
try to the Atlantic. We think that the pre-
vailing heat in this quarter of the last week OF
80 has been making vacuum which will
bring the rain. A heated term, in proportion
to it's heat, always does. The heaviest OF
most terrific storms always follow the intensesi
heats. In the science of meteorology COM
paratively little progress in this age of pro-
gress has been made, because Of the difficulty
of noting the movements and laws of storms.
Now, with the aid of the telegraph, scientific
men ought to be able to tell us all about the
weather that it is necessary to know. We
believe, too, that in the course of a few years,
with some aid from the government, such q
system of weather telegraphic reports might
be established as would result in the saving ol
millions of property by land and sea from
threatened losses from storms and floods and
droughts.
SUNDAY RUM.-If we may judge by the
amount of slashing and cutting done on Sun
day, there is some appearance that large
section Of the population Of the city will b'
reduced to hash before the Excise Commits
sioners make up their mind TO stop all these
| 4l< l III liaits thI