Dewsbury.
Not being quite satisfied with MR. INGLEBY'S answer to W. W.'s Query,
I beg to refer inquirers to the _Nautical Magazine_ for July, 1850,
and three subsequent months, in which will be found a translation by
Commander L. G. Heath, R.N., of a paper published by M. Arago in the
_Annuaire du Bureau des Longitudes_ for the year 1833, entitled "Does the
Moon exercise any appreciable Influence on our Atmosphere?" This treatise
enters fully into the subject, and gives the results of several courses
of experiments extending over many years; which go to prove that in
Germany, at all events, there is more rain during the waxing than during
the waning moon. Several popular errors are shown to have arisen in the
belief that certain appearances in the moon, really the _effect_ of
peculiar states of the atmosphere, were the _cause_ of such atmospheric
peculiarities; but we are allowed some ground for supposing that this
"vulgar error" may have some foundation in "vulgar truth."