Abstract
MR. ELLIS has made a valuable, contribution to the diurnal variation of the barometer in a paper published in the Journal of the Meteorological Society of London, which gives the hourly variations from the means of each month as deduced from a discussion of the, photographic records taken at the Royal Observatory during the twenty years ending 1873. The forenoon maximum occurs from May to July about 9 A.M., being fully an hour later than at Kew. The morning minimum at the same season becomes less marked than at other times of the year, as happens in situations more or less continental in middle and higher latitudes; and this feature of the diurnal variation is, it may be remarked, decidedly better marked at Kew than at Greenwich. Mr. Ellis gives, for comparison with Greenwich, the curves for Oxford, Washington Cape of Good Hope, and Ascension, from which he draws the broad conclusion that in high latitudes the forenoon maximum occurs earlier when, the sun rises early, it being however omitted to be pointed out that this holds good only in situations more or less continental or removed from the more immediate influence of the sea. Thus the forenoon maximum which occurs at Greenwich at 9 A.M. and at Kew at 8 A.M., is delayed at Falmouth and Valentia to about 11 A.M. or noon; whilst at Helder the time of its occurrence in June, is about 2 P.M. The hourly barometric values for the twenty years were arranged with reference to the time of the moon's meridian passage With the result that no certain indication of lunar variation was apparent. We hope that by-and-by the main details of this elaborate discussion will be printed; such details as will embrace, at least, the hourly values of each day and month of the twenty years for the examination of many inquiries referring to both civil and lunar days, which are now rising into questions of the highest importance.
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METEOROLOGICAL NOTES . Nature 18, 198–199 (1878). https://doi.org/10.1038/018198b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/018198b0