42 Life aizcl Letters of Francis Galton
Galton's suggestions with the isobar maps of to-day, still giving wind by arrows, recording temperature by figures and state of the heavens in words. This original meteorological map for the Times must have been at a later date than we are now considering, perhaps about 1869, as the drill pantagraph must have been previously constructed.
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But I cannot find that it was ever published. The first issue of a weather-map in the Times was on April 1, 1875, and we give on p. 43 a reproduction of it. An account of the matter was published in Nature, April 15, 1875. We give a few sentences from it:
The method of preparation of the chart seems simple enough at present, but it has been the fruit of much thought, as the problem of producing in the space of an hour a stereotype fit for use in a Walter machine has not been solved without many and troublesome experiments."
Then follows a brief description of the material, the drill pantagraph (see our p. 46) and the engraving of the block.
"The initiative in this new method of weather illustration is due to Mr Francis Galton
It is hardly necessary to allude to the value of such charts as these as a means of leading the public to gain some idea of the laws which govern some of our weather changes."
The Shipping Gazette started publishing on January 4, 1871 a daily chart for the winds round the coast of the British Isles on the basis of reports telegraphed to the Meteorological Office. It states in its issue that "this new system of showing the direction and force of the wind by movable types etc. has been entered at Stationers' Hall." After Galton's maps of 1861 and 1863, it is difficult to see why the system should be called `new.'
The publication of the Meteorographica placed Galton at once among
