INDIAN CLIMATES AND WEATHER.* THE physical vastness and variety of
what may be collectively called the British Eastern Dominion, extending in breadth from the frontiers of Persia to the borders of China, and in depth from the- ocean to the Himalaya, are brought out vividly by the clear and accurate picture of the climates and the weather which has been drawn by the skilful and experienced hand of Mr. Henry Blanford. We say "picture ;" for the immense masses of light and shade, the calm of sunshine and the violence of storm, filled in with expressive details of astonishing variety and interest, take that form when the imagination tries to realise and group the large breadths of fact recorded by tireless observation, and lucidly arranged by a writer who has translated the results of scientific investiga- tion into language at once precise and popular. He was moved to assist "the lay public" by the remark of the President of the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1887, who asked for a simple and popular manual which would reduce the mass of meteorological literature relating to India into a shape practically useful to practical men. That want has now been attractively supplied. For let it not be supposed that the subject is arid and dull. On the contrary, we have found this volume deeply interesting from the beginning to the end ; and it is because the author has disposed of the Winds, Clouds, Rainfall, and Temperature like an artist, that
• A Practical GuRe to the Climates and Weather of India. Ceylon, and Hannah, and the Storms of the Indian Seas. By Henry F. Blanford, F.R.S. London : Macmillan and Co.
we say the book is something more than a guide; it is a grand picture of Atmospheric India.
All know by report, and some by experience, that India is a land of sunshine. Thus, St. Aubin's in Jersey, the spot most favoured by Sol in the British Isles, enjoys a daily average of five hours of bright sunshine; but in Calcutta the records show more than seven, and in Allahabad more than eight hours. It is only in the rainy season that the Indian stations yield the palm. The highest sun-temperatures recorded in England do not differ much from those of Murree, a hill- station, and Madras; but the air-temperatures at these places are many degrees higher than those in England. So that the permanent effect is dry heat or damp heat, according to the relative humidity, which varies throughout the year, not only in the same place, but in every district, and not at the same time everywhere, but at different periods of the year in one place and another. Hence, there is not a climate of India; there are many climates within its bounds, and all are hot at some season, even in the hills ; for Ootacamund, which has its frosts and parlour-fires, also has a -spring temperature ex- ceeding 77 deg.; while Ranikhet and Shillong, both "cool" hill-stations, range as high as 87 and 84, and as low as 26 and 32. The records for the stations in the plains, and even some on the lower hills, of course contain entries of far higher temperatures, and much more trying conditions. Mr. Blan- ford, has scanned the whole series and set down in broad detail, so far as space would permit, the characteristics of climates which differ so much as those of Sind and Travancore, the Deccan and the Carnatic, the Punjab and Eastern Bengal, the Gangetic plain and the European villages perched above in "cltelon on the spurs of the Himalaya, from Simla, Darjiling.
Nor is the rainfall on this continent which we style the Indian Peninsula, less, but more varied. The contrasts are most startling, since they range from more than forty feet at Cherrapunji, in the Khasi Hills, to four inches, and sometimes one inch, at Jacobabad, in Sind. Even at Leh, deep in the mountains, the yearly fall is only two inches and a half. From these minute quantities the gamut ascends, not so much in steps as by leaps and bounds, to the huge aggregates of Cherrapunji and Mahableshwar. If the rain which descends during the year were regularly distributed, it would give some forty-two inches for the whole region, excluding Burmah ; but as the distribution is astoundingly irregular, some provinces are drenched, and the precious water runs to waste, while others are parched. In all, however, when the rain comes down, it is in floods, twenty inches in four-and-twenty hours having been known to fall on one spot in arid Sind. It is observed, also, that the fertilising showers are most uncertain where at all times the supply is the smallest ; and that a tract near the wet regions of the Western Ghats, distant from them only a few miles to the eastward, has a rainfall which consists of about as many inches as their summits receive in feet. There are inland territories where the fall is regular, even when it is comparatively light; but extensive spaces which should have a fair quantity of moisture suffer from disastrous droughts. The south-west monsoon is really the great rain- bringer, and the summer months are the wettest in the year in the countries affected by that blessing. Yet it operates in a curiously partial manner. The belt of heavy rainfall, starting in South-West Ceylon, runs along the coast through Travan- core to the end of the Ghats, south of the Tapti. It has its ceunterpart in point of quantity in Eastern Bengal, Cachar, along the face of the Khasi Hills to Assam, whence the belt goes westerly far along the Himalayas. Between these ridges of downpour lie the plains and hills where the fall varies from thirty to seventy inches; while in the extreme North-West and North it ranges from five to twenty, and is uncertain. Although so near the points where the monsoon breaks, the north-eastern part of Ceylon and the Carnatic do not get their rain until the north-east monsoon blows in November and December. "There is no time in the year in which rain does not fall in some part of India," says Mr. Blanford ; but the chief supply comes from the South-West in the summer months, and affects the whole dominion, more or less, except the Southern angle, even the plain of Manaar, opposite Ceylon, remaining athirst while Travancore and Cochin enjoy a deluge. The reader can easily imagine what a wealth of interesting detail is found in the general description of these varied phenomena exhibited over such a-grand expanse.
But if the fervid intensity and duration of sunshine, and the spring showers as well as the annual torrents of rain, excite and feed the sensations of curiosity and wonder at the variety and magnitude of the processes and results, the tempests by sea and land produce a profound impression of awe. The rains bring disease as well as plenty, and their absence famine, with her sister, pestilence, working so slowly and almost imperceptibly from hour to hour, that we only and partially realise the dread affliction by the aggregate of desolation and death. But the cyclone and rarer tornado have a dramatic energy and majestic resistless movement which strike with instant force on the imagination, call up the shapes of agony and terror, at once exalting and appalling the most steadfast mind. They are like the migrations of barbaric armies whose life is march and battle, who pass and leave a broad track of destruction. Mr. Blanford has written his chapters on these mighty storms in order to serve prac- tical purposes, and especially to aid the seafarer by laying down, so far as may be, the laws which, with variations, regulate their progress on the ocean, and suggesting the best means of escaping from the furious tumult of wind and wave raging round the centre of calm. But it is impossible to read his carefully composed account without feeling admiration and awe at the grandeur, overbearing imperious motion, and destructive sweep of these stupendous exhibitions of atmospheric power. Some travel immense distances, having been known, after forming on the ocean, to strike the land, cross from the Coro- mandel to the Malabar coast, and renew their energies on the Arabian Sea ; or, quitting the head of the Bay, to push over- land on a curve which carries them once more to salt water on the coast of Beloochistan. One only has been ascertained to have made the reverse journey, starting from Beloochistan and reaching the Araccan shore near Akyab. When the cyclone is accompanied by a storm-wave, it is deadly on the low shores, like that which in 1876 drowned 100,000 human beings in Eastern Bengal ; but although cyclonic storms may be called common, "cyclones of great violence," we read, "are comparatively rare," not more than two in the year, on an average, in the Bay of Bengal, and less in the Arabian Sea. The rates of progress of these storms are probably less than is generally imagined, fully one-half (sixty-four) of those which have been noted in the Bay moving at from four to eight miles, while only seven exceeded a velocity of twelve miles an hour. Their cradles, directions, rapidity, and the seasons at which they appear, the action of the barometer on their approach, and the weather-signs which precede them, together with rules for practical guidance, based on the latest conclusions of science, are clearly described and laid down by Mr. Blanford, so that the mariner may derive the greatest profit from his labours.
The whole of the complex phenomena pertaining to climates and weather is treated in such a masterly fashion, and the matter is so admirably arranged, that the "lay public," for whom the book is intended, cannot fail to reap some part of the harvest so bountifully supplied. To all persons interested in India, who have no inclination or time for a regular study of meteorology, yet who desire to learn the general or special conditions under which they or their connections may have to live, this volume should be welcome. In a brief notice, as only a few points can be slightly touched, we are compelled to pass over many attractive sections of the vast subject, such as the hill-stations, the rainfall in relation to water-supply, and the whole group of questions illustrated by authentic weather-charts. The diagrams are clear and instructive, and the tables in the text and appendix well constructed. The work is what it professes to be, a "practical guide," and it is not often that a book of this kind is written with such sustained 'vivacity and brightness.
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