Sunbeams travel straight to earth, unbending as arrows in their flight, and unaided they can not creep any distance round a solid body, though they may be reflected or turned back from it. But the air breaks up the sunbeams, bends them, diffuses them, spreads them about, surrounds us with a delicate lacework of woven light. A sunbeam traveling through space is invisible till it strikes upon some object. If that object is solid, the light of the sunbeam is partly absorbed, partly reflected; if the object is transparent, the sunbeam passes through and onward. Few substances, if any, are perfectly transparent. We call air transparent, yet it is so only in a measure. Each sunbeam passing through the atmosphere loses part of its brightness by the way, and so the great glare of the sun is softened before it reaches the lower depths of the air-ocean. The sun’s rays are rays of heat as well as of light. While the atmosphere softens the glare, giving us shade and twilight, it also modifies the extremes of temperature, from which, without air, we should suffer. When the sun goes down, although we are often conscious of a chill, it is not the instant and overwhelming chill which we should feel but for the atmosphere. All day long the sun has been warming the earth and air. When his direct rays are withdrawn, the warm air for a while keeps its warmth, and gives over of that warmth to us. WEATHER --SIR RALPH ABERCROMBY The earliest records of weather among every nation are to be found in those myths, or popular tales, which, while describing rain, cloud, wind, and other natural phenomena in highly figurative language, refer them to some supernatural or personal agency by way of explanation. The most interesting thing about these mythical stories is the remarkable fidelity with which they reflect the climate of the country that gave them birth. For example, from the mythologies of Greece and Scandinavia we can almost construct an account of the climate of those two countries by simply translating the figurative phraseology of their legends into the language of modern meteorology. Many survivals of mystic speech are still found among popular prognostics, and especially in cloud names. In England and Sweden “Noah’s Ark” is still seen in the sky, while in Germany the “Sea-Ship” still turns its head to the wind before rain. In Scotland the “Wind-Dog” and the “Boar’s Head” are still the dread of the fisherman, while such names as “Goat’s Hair” and “Mare’s Tails” recall some of the shaggy monsters of antiquity.