_Rainfall._--The rainfall of England, being largely due to passing cyclones, can hardly be expected to show a very close relation to the physical features of the country, yet looked at in a general way the relation between prevailing winds and orographic structure is not obscure. The western or mountainous division is the wettest at all seasons, each orographic group forming a centre of heavy precipitation. There are few places in the Western Division where the rainfall is less than 35 in., while in Wales, the Cornwall-Devon peninsula, the Lake District and the southern part of the Pennine Region the precipitation exceeds 40 in., and in Wales and the Lake District considerable areas have a rainfall of over 60 in. In the Eastern Division, on the other hand, an annual rainfall exceeding 30 in. is rare, and in the low ground about the mouth of the Thames estuary and around the Wash the mean annual rainfall is less than 25 in. In the Western Division and along the south coast the driest month is usually April or May, while in the Eastern Division it is February or March. The wettest month for most parts of England is October, the most noticeable exception being in East Anglia, where, on account of the frequency of summer thunderstorms, July is the month in which most rain falls, although October is not far behind. In the Western Division there is a tendency for the annual maximum of rainfall to occur later than October. It may be stated generally that the Western Division is mild and wet in winter, and cool and less wet in summer; while the Eastern Division is cold and dry in winter and spring, and hot and less dry in summer and autumn. The south coast occupies an intermediate position between the two as regards climate. Attention has been called to the fact that the bare rocks and steep gradients which are common in the Western Division allow of the heavy rainfall running off the surface rapidly, while the flat and often clayey lands of the Eastern Division retain the scantier rainfall in the soil for a longer time, so that for agricultural purposes the effect of the rainfall is not very dissimilar throughout the country. _Sunshine._--The distribution of sunshine is not yet fully investigated, but it appears that the sunniest part is the extreme south coast, where alone the total number of hours of bright sunshine reaches an average of more than 1600 per annum. The north-east, including the Pennine Region and the whole of Yorkshire, has less than 1300 hours of sunshine, and a portion of North Wales is equally cloudy. Although little more than a guess, 1375 hours may be put down as approximately the average duration of bright sunshine for England as a whole, which may be compared with 2600 hours for Italy, and probably about 1200 hours for Norway.