rather more than 39 inches at Tromso, and 26 inches at Gjesvser.
The -whole of Finmarken has a small rainfall, viz. from 20 to 24
inches on the coast, from 12 to 16 inches np the fjords and on
the inland platean. Trondhjem and the most northerly coast
district have the greatest, number of wet days in the year — more
than 200; and the stations in the fjords of Finmarken have the
fewest S- about 100. Most rain falls in the summer and part of
the antumn (in Lofoten, however, in the winter), least in April
and May. Angust and September have the greatest numb e r of
wet days, the fewest are in the summer and spring, except in
the interior of Finmarken, where there are fewest in the winter.
Sn ow falls on more than half the annual total number of
wet days over the whole of Finmarken, and as far south as Lofoten.
South of that, the relative number of snowy days is smaller.
On the Trondhjem Fjord, snow does not even fall upon a third
part of the total number of wet days.
Hail has been observed on an average as many as 20 times
in the year in the southernmost districts, but occurs much less
frequently in Finmarken, in some places scarcely once a year.
Fog makes its appearance, on an average, from 10 to 20 days
in the year, most frequently in the summer and autumn. Frost-
fog occurs at the heads of the fjords.
T h u n d e r - s to rm s are very'seldom experienced on the coast,
only sometimes in winter. In the interior of Finmarken, and about the
Trondhjem Fjord, there are, on an average, 4 or 5 thunder-storms
in the course of the summer. In Trondhjem itself, there has been
thunder in all the months of the year except April.'
I t will be seen from the above roughly sketched survey of
the most important climatological data, that the most varied shades
of continental and maritime climates are represented within the
confines of Norway. In the inland districts of south-eastern Norway
and Finmarken, with their severe winter and relatively high temperature
maxima in the summer, with their gentle breezes and small rainfall,
we have examples of the most typical inland climate; and along
the whole length of coast-line, where the winter is unusually mild,
and the summer cool, where rain falls in abundance,- and the weather
is unsettled and changeable with frequent storms, we have examples
of an equally typical maritime climate. But in spite of these great
contrasts, the influence of the Gulf Stream can be traced all over the
country. I t is in the power of this mighty current to heat the strata
of air above it, and it thus becomes one of the chief agencies to
which Norway'owes her conditions as a civilised inhabited country
to her very farthest bounds on the shores of the polar sea.
The meteorological observations which formed the basis for
the above brief account of the Norwegian climate have been collected
and worked out by the Norwegian Meteorological Institute,
which was founded in 1866 as a government institution under
the Norwegian university in Eristiania, and is still working under
the guidance of its founder, the well-known meteorological professor,
D r . H. M o h n . At the present time, the institute receives
observations regularly from 456 stations, of which 350 have been
established solely for the observation of the rainfall.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
Meteorologische Beobachtungen. A u f gezeichnet a u f _Christiania Observatorium■
1837—1867. Kristiania 1866;
Meteörologiske Iagttagelser paa fern Telegraf stationer ved Norges Ky st 1861 til
1863. Kristiania 1866.
Meteorologiske Iagttagelser i del sydlige Borge 1863—1866. Kristiania 1867.
Norsk météorologiste Aarbog. 1867^ }1873. Kristiania 1868—1874.
Jahrbuch des • norwegischen meteorologischen Instituts. 1874—1898.' Kristiania
1877—1899.
Ulima-Tabeller fo r Norge I—1 7 . (Kristiania Tidenskàbsselskabs SkrifterJ. Kristiania
1895—1898.