206 MR. SELBY's OBSEEVATIOirS AND NOTES 



as for the fatal effects of that extraordinary disease which 

 first attacked the potato crop in 1845, was not unproductive 

 of facts of an interesting nature to the Naturalist, and par- 

 ticularly to the Entomologist, — a notice of which, so far as they 

 fell within my observation, I now offer to the Members of 

 the Club. I may premise that the winter which followed the 

 cold and ungenial summer and autumn of 1845, had been of 

 a character remarkable for its warmth and mildness, the ther- 

 mometer, during the months of January and February 1846, 

 indicating, from my register, an excess of temperature of from 

 seven to eight degrees above the corresponding months of 

 1845, and of the current year. Among my other notes, I find 

 it recorded that the Ring-Dove commenced cooing on the 

 eleventh day of January, a month before the average period, 

 deduced from observations made during a series of years ; 

 and that the Missel and the common Thrush were in full 

 song on the 10th of the same month. In consequence of this 

 unwonted and unseasonable temperature, vegetation was pre- 

 maturely called into activity, and many shrubs and trees were 

 farther advanced by the middle of March, than they usually 

 are in the early part of May. 



A sudden changeof wind, however, from south-west and west 

 to north and north-east on the 17th of MarcH, accompanied 

 in Northumberland and Durham by a heavy fall of snow, 

 and followed on the night of the 18th by an intense frost, 

 during which the thermometer in many situations fell as low 

 as 22° Fahr., proved fatal and destructive to all young and 

 tender shoots, as "well as to the blossoms of the wall fruit 

 trees and pears, most of which were at the time fully ex- 

 panded. South of York but little snow fell, neither was the 

 frost so severe, though sufficient to destroy the prospect of 

 an abundant crop of fruit. Cold north-east winds prevailed 

 up to the 10th of April, when more genial weather set in, 

 and towards the middle of May it became decidedly mild 

 and warm, and the temperature kept increasing during the 

 remainder of the month, and the greater part of June, with 

 much sunlight, and scarcely a shower of rain. Towards 

 the end of the month thunder-storms became prevalent, at- 

 tended in some parts by hail or ice showers, which did con- 



