NOTES.
89
Lightning Flashes during the Storm at Woodford of June 6th, 1889.
—This storm was accompanied by such remarkable electrical disturbances that
the following notes may be worthy of record. I observed the first flashes in the
east at about 8.50 p.m., and at about 9.10 I saw some very remarkable forked
lightning in that quarter. The peculiarity in the storm was the apparently
vertical direction of many of the flashes, some of which, after striking down,
seemed to ascend almost on the same line. The thunder was not so loud as it
often is, but the rapidity with which the flashes followed each other was most
remarkable. I made the following records, my watch being about four minutes
fast, I believe :—
in one hour. At 10.13 I was called away for a few minutes, so missed some
between that time and 10.37, but there were certainly upwards of 500 flashes in
the sixty minutes. The storm was overhead from 10.3 to 10.13, and afterwards
worked to the N.W. The lightning continued for about an hour more. I may
add that the rain was the heaviest I have known in this locality since I came to
Woodford in 1879. It swept the macadam quite bare in this road—"Sakes"
Lane.—N. F. Robarts, F.G.S., "Rosebrae," Woodford, June 9th, 1889.
The Storm of September 2nd, 1889.—A thunder-storm of a terrific and
unusual character swept over Essex during the night of September 2nd. A vast
amount of damage was done; many houses, trees, and stacks were fired, horses
killed, and the wooden bridge between Chelmsford and Writtle, erected for
temporary use when the old bridge was carried away during the flood of August
1st and 2nd last year (see Essex Naturalist, vol ii, pp. 199—205) was
partially destroyed. In some places, particularly near Brentwood and South Weald
(where the roads largely consist of rounded pebbles), the road-surface was com-
pletely destroyed, as the writer found to his cost whilst traversing the district after
the storm on a tricycle. Some striking details of the force and dangerous nature
of the storm were given in the "County Chronicle," the "Essex Weekly News,"
and other newspapers, of September 6th; and in "Nature," of October 3rd, Mr.
A. E. Brown writes at length of the effects of the lightning as exhibited at
Upminster, in Essex. At about 1 p.m. Mr. Abraham's windmill there was struck,
much damage being caused ; and he and a friend describe the flash as presenting
the appearance of "a mass or network of flame, which threw off thousands of
sparks like fireworks." After the flash a light appeared on the sail of the mill for
a few seconds, and fire was feared, but they supposed that the heavy rain prevented
this. Mr. Brown measured 4 inches of rain in seven hours in a field a mile away
from Upminster. Mr. Brown says all the effects of the charge seem to indicate
that it passed from earth to cloud.
Large Blocks of Conglomerate at Farnham, Essex.—I have in my garden
here two unusually large masses of Conglomerate (commonly known as "Hertford-
shire Pudding-stone" ). In 1881 these monoliths were removed by my direction
(a very arduous task) from a spot on the borders of Farnham, in Essex, about half-
a-mile distant from my house. They were found in a large arable field, having a
steep incline, bounded by a brook which empties itself into the river Stort. The
larger of these two conglomerates measures about 9 feet in its longest dimension,
and is been 5 and 6 feet wide at its base ; it is about 3 feet in its greatest thickness,
H