SOUTH CAROLINA 171 



28, and almost every morning it was at least 32 by 

 Fahrenheit. But this was an extraordinarily cold 

 winter, of no common severity also in the higher mid- 

 dle provinces on the other hand, the most northern 

 regions, as Nova Scotia and Canada, enjoyed a winter 

 quite as uncommonly mild. Here at Charleston there 

 was ice to be seen every morning on shallow water and 

 ponds, and in the houses. The poor negroes, who can 

 bear cold by no means well, crept about stiff and slug- 

 gish, whereas in the hottest weather, when the Euro- 

 pean is relaxed without strength, they are brisk and in- 

 dustrious. But of snow there was none; however in 

 the year 1776 it fell a foot deep, and lay nearly a week. 

 Chalmers, from 10 years' observations, gives the low- 

 est station of the quicksilver at 18 Fahrenh. and the 

 highest at 101 in the shade; but he mentions that the 

 quicksilver had once been known to fall as low as 10 

 Fahrenh. ; certainly extraordinary for so southern a 

 place. Such cold and frosty days are rarer in cus- 

 tomary winters, and never hold long without a change 

 to warm days; at any rate, only the evenings and 

 mornings are so cold, the midday sun soon giving the 

 atmosphere a pleasant warmth. During these cold 

 days of January and February, in the neighborhood of 

 Charleston not an indigenous plant was to be seen in 

 bloom ; for in this climate spring does not really come 

 before the middle of March or the beginning of April. 

 But in sundry gardens the following European plants 

 might be found greening and blooming: Alsine 

 media Lamium ample xicaule, Leontodon Taraxa- 

 cum, Rumex crispus & Acetosa, Poa annua, Vi- 

 tica dioica and Sonchus arvensis. Of garden-flowers 

 there were blooming at this time narcissuses and jon- 



