62
NOTES—ORIGINAL AND SELECTED.
meet with a few such examples, one of which was obtained from the Boulder
Clay at Felstead . . . . . . . It is a much hardened form ; every minute
ridge and marking of the original shell is preserved in this specimen.''
METEOROLOGY.
Extraordinary Rainfall in 1896 and 1897.—Mr. A. E. Watson, B.A.,
F.R., Met. Soc, writes on March 19th; giving the following figures of rainfall,
as measured at the Whitgift Grammar School, Croydon, Surrey, which may-
be compared with those given for Lexden and Chelmsford by Mr. Hurnard
and Mr. Chancellor in the last number of the E. N. (ix., p. 264):—August,
1896, 2.24 inches; September, 7.55; October, 3.59; November, 1.62; Dec-
ember, 3.49; January, 1897, 2.09: February, 2.15; March I to 18th, 3.42 ;
total, 26.15.
The twenty-five years' average rainfall for Croydon is 261/4 inches;
consequently Mr. Watson adds "we have had practically a year's rainfall in
seven-and-a-half months, in addition to which September was the wettest
month of which we have any record."
The writer of the Agricultural Notes in the Standard on March 23rd, 1807,
remarks that it is "surely time for a settled improvement in climatic conditions,
as we have experienced more than seven months of generally rainy or misty
weather up to the 18th of March. A diary kept in a Middlesex district shows
that in August, 1896, after the 8th, there were only two intervals of as much
as two days and nights each free from rain and none in September. In
October, there were three intervals of three to four days each ; In November,
three of four to eleven days ; in December, one of eleven days ; in January,
1897, four of two to six days; and in February four of two; and in
March, only one of two days. But in these few and generally short
intervals, for the most part, the atmosphere was misty, or the sky was
overcast, and there was not a single whole week of fine and sunny
weather during the period of more than seven months, while the
rainfall as shown by a Croydon observer [Mr. Watson, quoted above] was only
a small fraction of an inch below a whole year's normal quantity. There is
too much reason to fear that the land has been drained of its nitrates to a
serious extent during such an exceptionally wet season, and that the crops
will suffer in consequence, unless the loss is covered by applications of
artificial manure."
The Weather of 1896 from the Farmer's point of View.—Mr.
Thomas B. Grubbe, of Ballast Quay Farm, Fingringhoe, has communicated
to the Essex Standard the following interesting observations of the weather in
his district:—" The year came in fair and mild, and we had but little frost
during the first two months of the year, and less than an average rainfall.
February was a particularly dry month, affording an opportunity for the early
seeding of peas, beans, and oats, a good deal of barley being also put in. Rain
came with March, and up till the middle of April the weather continued
showery and unsettled, affording but scant chances of making good seed-beds
for barley, and those who had sown in February had reason to congratulate
themselves. From April 17th to June 9th was very dry, and light land crops
suffered a good deal, but were relieved by a splendid ground rain on June 10,
the date of our local Essex Show at Brentwood. This came rather late for