The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1928-08-24

bits of floating material, such as dust
mOtes-a sort of magic carpet-and
crowd upon them.
Widely separated, the dust notes,
with their vapor passengers, at first
float about like asteroids in space, but
gradually the cold Of the upper re-
gions causes more and more of
the vapor molecules to jump out of
their gaseous form and attach them
selves to existing droplets until the
latter are built into drops heavy
enough to fall earthward.
Sometimes the first drops Of thun-
der shower seem huge, as they flash
past; but even the largest raindrOps
are relatively small. What is called
popularity Eight rain,' which just
escapes being "drizzle," is made up of
droplets only trifie larger than the
little black period that marks the end
of this sentence. A moderate rain"
consists of drops with diameters only
about twice that of the period, and
the distance through drop from a
''heavy rain" is about that across four
Or five periods touching one another
in a row. A rain classified as sex
cessiye" has drops about the size OF
a capital 90" When drops larger than
the latter fall steadily, the downpour
Is called cloudburst.
And they can be only a little larger
at that. Nature, through the laws of
physics, has set strict limits both upon
the size of raindrops and upon the
speed at which they can fall; and the
drop that attempts to pass either limit
is promptly blown to pieces. The
largest raindrops that strike the earth
have diameters about equal to the
diameter of the average lead pencil.
The greatest speed at which rain
drop may strike the earth, no matter
from how great a height it falls, Is
close to 80 feet a second-a speed less
than that of pebble dropped from .
fourth-story window.
In the average cloud that floats Oh
an overcast but rainless day-a cloud
such as those that bear most of the
worlds water from the sea-there are
not more than two tablespoonfuls of
water in cloud enough to fill the big
gest furniture van; and, unless you
live in a mansion, your dining room
could not held half the cloud SUBJ
stance that nature has crammed into
one glass of water on your breakfast
table.
Clouds Work for Man.
Clouds are power. for man as well
as for nature The clean white scrap
of mist floating in the sky and the
grimy, black lump of coal far under
ground are brothers under their sinks
both children of the sun. One, born
millions of years ago and locked deep
in the earth, must be toilfully dug out
and brought to the surface before it
will yield the power it holds. The
other, born yesterday, will presently
mine itself; and if its fragments are
merely guided on their dash to the
sea, they seem eager to turn mans
machinery.
Man cannot tow his loads of sky
coal where he will. Nature sends
them along definite highways and
dumps them with fair regularity In
her chosen places. For ages man
used them only near where they fell
or along the channels they wore in
their slide seward; but now he has
in effect scattered the clouds. He
has learned to transmute the down.
hill wanderlust of their fragments into
invisible put potent streams of cleo
irons that will course along wires far
from the old limiting channels. And
now, though you live in a desert where
you seldom see cloud you may have
those of more favored lands for your
servants. Press button and they
light your house, boil your coffee, and
perhaps even curl your hair.
Fortunate it is that that portion of
the sea which hangs ever in the air Ia
scattered; for if all the clouds should
gather and dump their burdens, now
over one limited area, now over an
other, man and his works and most
vegetation would be uprooted and
swept from the face of the earth.
1t is no less fortunate that rivers
and glaciers and clouds are pouring
water into the seas almost exactly as
fast as it is being taken out by the
sun. If in some way the amount which
now evaporates daily were pocketed In
a Gargantuan cave or flung away into
space, the oceans would last less than
200 years.