The intense heat of the weather, which is so unusual
as to impart a kind of novelty to the standing subject of English conversation, has been accom- panied, not in the Metropolis, but in different parts of the country, especially the North, by storms of rain and thunder of uncommon severity. The most remarkable happened at Stroud, on Monday last. The afternoon had been rainy ; about four o'clock there was a thunderstorm; at seven again ; the whole of the sky, except towards the North, being "as black as Erebus." About eleven three thunderstorms seemed to converge ; the clouds hurried about without any fixed direction; and all night the storm raged with fury, the lightning leaping from cloud to cloud. The rain poured in torrents, and washed the roads to their foundations. About two in the morning, a vivid flash and a terrific clap of thunder finished the elemental commotion. Sun- strokes have been frequent, and, at some few places, fatal.
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