in one mass of water
upon the earth. Nothing could withstand it. The best finished windows
were ineffectual against it, and every room exposed to the north-east was
deluged. The smaller animals, the birds, and especially game, of all
kinds, were destroyed in great numbers by the rain alone, and the mother
partridge, with her brood and her mate, were found chilled to death
amidst the drenching wet. It was also noticed, that, as soon as the
flood touched the foundation of a dry stone wall, the sods on the top of
it became as it were alive with mice, all forcing their way out to escape
from the inundation which threatened their citadel; and in the stables,
where the water was three feet deep, rats and moles were swimming about
among the buildings.

Among the Andes it is said to rain perpetually; but in Peru it never
rains, moisture being supplied during a part of the year by thick fogs,
called _garuas_. In Egypt, and some parts of Arabia, it seldom rains at
all, but the dews are heavy, and supply with moisture the few plants of
the sandy regions.

There is a great variation in the quantity of rain that falls in the same
latitude, on the different sides of the same continent, and particularly
of the same island. The mean fall of rain at Edinburgh, on the eastern
coast, is 26 inches; while at Glasgow, on the western coast, in nearly
the same latitude, it is 40 inches. At North Shields, on the eastern
coast, it is 25 inches; while at Coniston, in Lancashire, in nearly the
same latitude, on the western coast, it is 85 inches.

The amount of rain in a district may be changed by destroying or forming
forests, and by the inclosure and drainage of land. By thinning off the
wood in the neighbourhood of Marseilles, there has been a striking
decrease of rain in fifty years.

In Mr. Howard's observations on the climate of this country, he has
found, on an average of years, that it rains every other day; that more
rain falls in the night than in the day; that the greatest quantity of
rain falls in autumn, and the least in winter; that the quantity which
falls in autumn is nearly double that in spring; that most rain falls in
October and least in February, and that May comes nearest to the mean:
that one year in every five, in this country, may be expected to be
extremely dry, and one in ten extremely wet.

According to Dalton, the mean annual amount of rain and dew for England
and Wales is 36 inches. The mean all over the