Ocean Rainfall

Abstract

WITH reference to Mr. Miller's note (NATURE, vol. vii. p. 123), I think it may be desirable to point out that a good many steps have been taken in the direction he suggests. As I believe Mr. Miller is a reader of “British Rainfall,” he will probably hardly need to be reminded of the article on “Ocean Rainfall,” by Mr. F. Gaster in the volume for 1866, wherein tables of the prevalence of rain in the North and South Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans are given in considerable detail. The determination of the amount is a far more difficult matter for a number of reasons, which would require much space fully to explain, and I am not at all surprised at the feat being considered “impossible;” but the use of that word is becoming restricted. At the British Association meeting at Brighton, Mr. W. T. Black was kind enough to show me a rain gauge which he had had constructed somewhat on the plan described by him in the Journal of the Scoltish Meteorological Society for January 1870, and which he intended should make a few voyages on purpose to test.