WATER *MA an extraordinary me teor, most frequently observed at sea. It generally begins by a cloud, which ap pears very small, and which is called by the sailors the squall : this augments in a little time into all enormous cloud of a cy lindrical form, or that of a cone on its apex, and produces a noise like the roar ing of an agitated sea, sometimes accom panied with thunder and lightning, and al so large quantities ofrain or hail, sufficient to inundate large vessels, and carry away in their course, when they occur by land, trees, houses, and every thing that op pose their impetuosity. Sailors, dread ing the fatal consequences of water spouts, endeavour to dissipate them by firing a cannon into them just before they ap proach the ship. We shall give an ac count of one as described by M. Tourne fort, in his Voyage to the Levant.
" The first of these," says this traveller, " that we saw, was about a musquet-shot from our ship. There we perceived the water began to boil, and to rise about a foot above its level. The water was agitated and whitish ; and above its surface there seemed to stand a smoke, such as might be imagined to come from wet straw be fore it begins to blaze. It made a sort of a murmuring sound, like that of a torrent heard at a distance, mixed, at the same time, with a hissing noise, like that of a serpent : shortly after we perceived a column of this smoke rise up to the clouds; at the same time whirling about with great rapidity. It appeared to be as thick as one's finger ; and the former sound still continued. When this disap peared, after lasting for about eight mi nutes, upon turning to the opposite guar ter of the sky, we perceived another, which began in the manner of the for mer: presently after a third appeared in the west ; and instantly beside it still an other arose. The most distant of these three could not be above a musket-shot from the ship. They all continued like so many heaps of wet straw set on fire, that continued to smoke, and to make the same noise as before. We soon after per ceived each, with its respective canal, mounting up in the clouds ; and spread ing, where it touched the cloud, like the mouth of a trumpet ; making a figure, to express it intelligibly, as if the tail of an animal was pulled at one end by a weight. These canals were of a whitish colour, and so tinged, as I suppose, by the water which was contained in them ; for, pre vious to this, they were apparently emp ty, and of the colour of transparent glass. These canals were not straight, but bent in some parts, and far from being per pendicular, but rising in their clouds with a very inclined ascent. But what is very particular, the cloud to which one of them was pointed happening to be driven by the wind, the spout still continued to follow its motion without being broken ; and passing behind one of the others, the spouts crossed each other in the form of a St. Andrew's cross. In the
beginning they were all about as thick as one's finger, except at the top, where they were broader, and two of them disappeared ; but shortly after the last of the three increased considerably, and its canal, which was at first so small, soon became as thick as a man's arm, then as his leg, and at last thicker than his whole body. We saw distinctly, through this transparent body, the water, which rose up with a kind of spiral motion ; and it sometimes diminished a little of its thick ness, and again resumed the same ; some times widening at top, and sometimes at bottom ; exactly resembling a gut filled with water, [tressed with the fingers, to make the fluid rise or fall ; and I am well convinced that this alteration in the spout was caused by the wind, which pressed the cloud, and compelled it to give up its contents. After some time its bulk was so diminished as to be no thicker than a man's arm again, and thus swell ing and diminishing, it at last became very small. In the end, I observed the sea, which was raised about it, to resume its level by degrees, and the end of the ca nal that touched it to become as small as if it had been tied round with a cord; and this continued till the light, striking through the cloud, took away the view. I still, however, continued to look, ex pecting that its parts would join again, as I had before seen in one of the others, in which the spout was more than once broken, and yet again came together ; but I was disappointed, for the spout ap peared no more." In the Philosophical Transactions we have descriptions of several ; their effects, in some instances, are probably much ex aggerated. One at Topsham is said to have cut down an apple-tree, several inches in diameter : another, we are told, seemed to be produced by a concourse of winds, turning like a screw, the clouds dropping down into it : it threw trees and branches about with a gyratory motion. See Philosophical Transactions, vol. xxii. and xxiii. One in Deeping Fen, Lincolnshire, was first seen moving across the land and water of the fen : it raised the dust, broke some gates, and destroy ed a field of turnips : it vanished with an appearance of fire. Dr. Franklin sup poses that a vacuum is made by the rota tory motion of the ascending air, as when water is running through a funnel, and that the water of the sea is thus rais ed. But Dr. Young says, no such cause could do more thim produce a slight ra refaction of the air, much less raise the water to the height of thirty or forty feet, or more.