Compiled from Cook's Geology, 1881.

THE earliest printed notice of the climate of New Jersey is in "A description of the province of New Albion, etc. published in 1648." The following extract from it is here given"

Whereas that part of America or North Virginia, lying about 39 degrees on Delaware bay, called the province of New Albion, is situated in the best and same temperature as Italy, between too cold Germany, and too hot Barbary ; so this lying just midway between New England 200 miles and Virginia 130 miles south, where now are settled 8,000 English, and 140 ships in trade, is freed from the extreme cold and barreness of the one, and heat and aguish marshes of the other, and is like Lumbardy, and a rich fat soil, plain, and having thirty-four rivers on the main land, seventeen great Isles, and partaketh of the healthiest aire and most excellent commodities of Europe, and replenished with the goodliest woods of oaks and all timber for ships and masts, mulberries, sweet cypress, cedars, pines and firres, four sorts of grapes for wines and raisins, and with the greatest variety of choice fruits, fish and fowl, stored with all sorts of corn, yeelding five, seven, and ten quarters an acre.

From the account of Thomas Rudyard, a deputy governor of East Jersey, written in 1683, we extract the following paragraph descriptive of that province:

As for the temperature of the air, it is wonderfully situated to the humors of mankind; the wind and weather rarely holding one point or one kind, for ten days together; it is a rare thing for vessels to be wind bound for a week together, the wind seldom holding in a point more than forty-eight hours; and in a short time we have wet and dry, warm and cold weather.

In Thomas Budd's "Good Order Established it Pennsylvania and New Jersey in America," printer in 1685, there is the following:

"The dayes in the winter are about two hours longer, and in the summer two hours shorter than in England; the summer somewhat hotter which causeth the fruits and corn somewhat to ripen faster than in England, and the harvest for Wheat, Rye and Barley being about the latter end of June. In the winter season it is cold and freezing weather and sometimes snow, but commonly very clear and sunshine, which soon dissolves it.

The winter temperature of Reykjavik, in Iceland in latitude 64°, is 29° Fahrenheit, or above that of the Highlands. The northern limit of the beach o 'Norway is about 60° north latitude, whereas it British America it does not extend beyond the 50th parallel. Examples could be multiplied indefinitely showing like variations.

The climate of Northern New Jersey, or so much bloom out of doors the whole year, while at London and in the interior, there are frosts and snows. These are examples of oceanic and insular climates.

It would seem as if in the interior there was an interchange of the torrid and arctic zones, and that our north temperate zone partakes somewhat of the extremes of both of them; or, in other words, we have a sub-tropical summer and an arctic winter, although the general influence of the ocean waters is to produce an equable climate, that at any given locality is somewhat determined by the nature of the currents off the shore and the direction of the prevailing winds. The latter may help in carrying inland the warmth of the equatorial waters, or, if they come from land surfaces, they may counteract and neutralize the moderating influences of warm currents.

The atmosphere, like the ocean, is traversed by currents, and cold air, like cold water, is denser than warm, and consequently there is a constant circulation – air currents which sweep over vast areas of the globe, carrying with them heat from the equatorial to temperate zones, and the warmth gathered from ocean currents, far inland. Wherever the prevailing winds come from water areas, they bring with them the equalizing effects of water, and the equable climate of ocean or insular locations are thus felt further inland than in those islands or coast localities which are on the sides of continents opposite to the prevailing wind quarter. The popular "cold waves" are the transference of great bodies of cold air from west to east across our continent, through the agency of the prevailing land currents. These westerly winds, in the summer, bring us the heated air of the southwest. Thus they serve to intensify our extremes of temperature, by excessive heat in summer and severe cold in winter. The measured effects of these air currents, as recorded by the thermometer in the following tables, are often sudden and very considerable. Changes in temperature of 63° in forty-one hours have been recorded in Texas, and in Essex County recently there was a change in temperature of over 40° in seventeen hours, due to a "cold wave" from the west. 

The excellence of some solid bodies, like sand and some rock, to arrest heat, is well known. They are easily warmed, and almost as readily part with their heat. This peculiarity of the solid mass of the earth's surface, as distinguished from the water, explains the intense heat of such surfaces when exposed to the vertical rays of the sun, and the rapid radiation of the heat during the night, produces extreme cold. Hence the alternations of temperature by day and by night are much greater in the surface layers of the land than in that of the waters. But there is a great variation in the nature of the surface, and its effects upon the climate, or upon the superincumbent air stratum, are as diverse as its nature. Hence widespread sandy plains are more heated than rich, fertile lands which are covered by luxuriant crops. This more intensely heated surface heats the layer of air in contact with it, and induces a circulation so as to allow a cooler stratum to take its turn in being heated.

The surface covering of grasses and grains serves to protect it from the fierce rays of the sun, and also to shield it from the cold of winter, Trees intercept by their thick foliage the sun's rays, and by their shade protect the soil. Their leaf-mould and the natural undergrowth still further protect the earth, so that often the ground remains unfrozen in the woods, when in adjacent fields or open spaces the frost penetrates deeply. The covering of trees acts therefore as a screen against sun and wind, and serves to maintain a more even temperature in the soil. The forest also serves as a wind-break or screen, and winds are not so violent as they otherwise would be, and the general influence of the forests is to make the temperature more even; to retain the moisture of the soil longer; to arrest and condense rain-giving clouds, and hold the rains and snow longer in and on the surface, and to produce a more equable and moist climate.

The following tables give the temperature and con- dition of weather, as kept by the late Mr. William A. Whitehead, of Newark, from 1843 to 1880, a period of thirty-eight years:

Rain and Melted Snow
Geology of New Jersey, by Prof. G. H. Cook.

The following is a statement of the mean amount of precipitation of rain and melted snow, for the periods and points named in Essex and Hudson counties. The depth is given in inches and fractions of inches for the average seasons, and average per year.

• Jersey City, Spring, 11.34; Summer, 13.70; Autumn, 10.37; Winter, 8.81; per year, 44.220; from March, 1871, to March, 1877, by Thomas T. Howard, Jr.

• Bloomfield, Spring, 11.34; Summer, 12.37; Autumn, 9.18; Winter, 9.49; per year, 42.380; from March, 1849, to December, 1862, by R. L. Cook.

• Newark, Spring, 11.71; Summer, 13.35; Autumn, 10.94; Winter, 10.68; per year, 46.217; from May, 1843, to December, 1880, by William A. Whitehead.

• East Orange, Spring, 11.11; Summer, 13.66; Autumn, 13.04; Winter, 9.15; per year, 46.960; from June, 1877, to September, 1879, by Thomas T. Howard, Jr.

• Orange, Spring, 11.65; Summer, 15.58; Autumn, 12.47; Winter, 6.78; per year, 46.480; from January, 1872, to December, 1874, by Dr. W. H. Stockwell.

• South Orange, Spring, 10.17; Summer, 13.92; Autumn, 10.90; Winter, 10.10; per year, 45.090; from September, 1870, to December, 1880, by Dr. William J. Chandler.

-The depth of snow is not given in the above statement of rainfall, since it is melted, as so much water or rain. The depth varies greatly from winter to winter in different sections.

The measurements of Mr. Whitehead, at Newark, range between six feet three inches in the winter of 1867-8, and one foot two inches in that of 1877-8; and they give an average depth for thirty-seven winters of forty inches. Referring to Mr. Whitehead's Newark table, we find that the average number of fair days in thirty-seven years was two hundred and fifteen; of rainy days, ninety-five; of snowy days, twenty-eight. By months, the highest average of fair days was twenty and one-half, in June; and the least, sixteen, in November.

Drought.