Democratic Sentinel, Volume 8, Number 26, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 July 1884 — CYCLONES. [ARTICLE]

CYCLONES.

Bow They Form ond Travel. Cyclones invariably come from the west, and travel in an eastern direction. bcientsts say "the general direction •f movement of the tornado is invariably from a point in the southwest quadrant to a point in the northwest quadrant.* A cyclone never travels from east to west. It rashes through the air left warm where the sun has passed. A cyclone never occurs on a cold day, never starts at night, and usually occurs in the afternoon. The sun s nines all day and in the afternoon gets a bead on some western plain or like place. It shines warmly. The air becomes rarefied. The breath fails to supply the needed amount of oxygen, and one feels exhausted. There is a stillness that is oppressive, broken, perhaps, by little puds that seem to come from a heated furnace. One feels a sickly sensation from the sun’s rays. All this time the Bun is shooting his heat right down at the spot as though he had been commanded to stand still and had concentrated his power on one little patch of his field of labor. The air beoomes unnaturally heated. It is not in its normal condition. Things are not as they should be. Nature’s system is getting out of order. The rarefied air begins to rise. It continues to heat. Jt rises some more. The colder air runs in at the sides to fill the vacuum and instantly the tornado is put in motion. Did you ever see the peg pulled out of a horse trough and watch the water turn round and round as it ran out ? That is the way the air turns round in a cyclone as it rashes in from all sides. The earth is surrounded by air to a height of fifty or seventy miles, and that air kas waves on its surface like waves on an ocean. The column of rarefied air that starts the cyclone draws on all sides for colder air, for the air that nature needs to establish the equilibrium, but instead of a gentle breeze or a brisk wind, the effort is so stupendous that the angry cyclone is the result; and the rushing oolumn dashes around, lookin out for restoring nature’s equilibrium, but unmindful of the devastation worked on the face of the earth. Tfierefore man must stand from under. If one oares to see the principle of a cyclone’s starting he can do so by setting a heated smoothing iron where the light shines through a window. The small particles that are in the air will be seen to float toward the iron and on nearing it will rash upward in the column of heated air.

Did you ever see a whirlwind on a cold or windy day? After the cyclone starts moving across the country its winds whirl round and round in this country in a direction opposite to that of the hands of a watch. The signal observers give some interesting descriptions of cyclones. A work on cyelones just issued from the Government press says the sudden appearance of ominous clouds first in the northwest or northeast, or perhaps reversed in the order of their appearance, generally attracts the attention of the most casual observer. In almost all cases these premonitory clouds are unlike any ordinary formation. If they are light, their appearance resembles smoke issuing from a burning building or straw-stack, rolling upward in fantastic shapes to great heights. Sometimes they are like fine mist, or quite white like fog or steam. Some persons describe these light clouds as at times apparently irridescent, or glowing as if a pale, whitidh light issued from their irregular surfaces. If the premonitory clouds are dark, and present a deep greenish hue, this fairly forebodes very great evil. So, also, if they appear jet black, from the center to circumference, or if this deep jet color appears only at the center, gradually diminishing in intensity as the outer edges of the clouds or bank of clouds are approached. Sometimes these dark clouds instead of appearing in solid, heavy masses, roll up lightly but still intensely black, like the smoke from an engine or locomotive burning soft coal. They have been described as of a purple or bluish tinge, or at times possessed of a strange lividness, or frequently dark green and again of an inky blackness that fairly startles you with its intensity. This mass of furiously boiling clouds, roaring like thunder, and if at night flashing with wild lightning, strikes terror to the heart of the beholder. As the clouds approach from opposite directions they are suddenly thrown into the greatest confusion, breaking up as it were into small portions which dash pell mell over each other and in every direction, now darting toward the earth, now rushing upward to considerable height, or at moderate elevations, roiling over each other ip a whirl like a pack of dogs in a fight. Generally following closely upon the existence of this condition, the funnel-shaped tornado cloud appears against the western gky, moving boldly to the front from without this confnsed mass of flying clouds. Old soldiers say if you see a cannonball in the air, and it appears to be standing still, you would better hide. If it appears to be moving, there is no danger for you. So with the cyclone. If it is moving from one side to another, you are safe; if it seems to be standing still and only growing larger, it is coming directly at you. —Atlanta Constitution.