by the foot-hills of the Rocky Mountains, which
extend to the northern boundaries of Texas, this humid wind drives,
unresisted by any vertical obstruction, up the valley of the "Great
River," shedding on either hand its waters profusely; but their force
and character, in this long march, become spent, and they add only their
proportionate amount of rain to the Minnesota annual fall, while the
intermediate districts are chiefly dependent on them.

The northeast winds of spring and autumn, which sweep at times half
across the continent, usually begin at a low point along the Atlantic
coast--driving sometimes furiously, and always persistently, its
hurried, chilling current inland,--is baffled by this southwesterly
current of the Gulf, and always, sooner or later, turned, as it moves up
the coast and interior by the overpowering and underlying continental
winds which drive it back, bringing these northeasterly storms to us,
nearly always from a southwest quarter. We enlarge upon this class of
rain-storms for the purpose of showing, though imperfectly, their
non-prevalence over the State of Minnesota. This is important if it can
be, even but partially, established; since it is this particular class
of storms and winds, last referred to, that are to be so much avoided
and to which can be traced the initial point of most pulmonic troubles.

These storms from the northeast may begin in Texas, their course being
north and eastward; as that by the time they reach so northerly a point
as New York, their westward limit may not exceed St. Louis; and, in
further illustration, when Quebec feels the force of the storm, Chicago
is at its extreme western limit. This supposed course will convey the
general idea of the track of a northeaster when it envelops the whole
variable-climatic district of the Union. There is a singular eddy known
to all climatologists to exist in Iowa, where the annual precipitation
of water is great, exceeding that of all the surrounding States. There
has been no positive theory advanced, to our knowledge, explaining this
circumstance, but the mystery is solved, to our minds, quite clearly.
This eddy makes the key-point of contact of the humid Gulf winds with
the cool winds of the westerly current, and likewise being the
northwestern terminal point of the course of the great northeasters,
the contact being the cause of the excess in precipitation. We were
fortunate, while visiting last autumn this special wet d