134 THE RETROSPECT OF THE YEAR. 
cast away at night on Cape Cod, in a terrible snow storm, 
which continned a week. He also referred to more recent 
seasons, and of the cold winter of 1856-7, when in one 
week in January was the coldest day by the thermometer 
ever recorded of late years, mercury in Salem 20 below 
zero. Travel on the railroad between Boston and Salem 
entirely suspended from Tuesday morning to Thursday af- 
ternoon. The recent mild winters were also alluded to. 
The lecturer exhibited an interesting diasrram which he 
had prepared, showing at a glance the comparative sever- 
ity and mildness of each winter from 1629 to the present 
time. 
Monday, March 31, 1890.— Mv. George G. Russell 
of this city read a paper on his experiences at the Ander- 
sonville prison in 1864. He was captured at the battle of 
the Wilderness and was a prisoner eight months, four of 
which he spent in " Anderson ville," then under the charge 
of Gen. J. H. Winder, commander of the "confederate" 
prisons, to whom, no doubt, were due the sufferings of 
the Union men in those prisons. At the close of the war 
General Winder died from disease contracted in one of 
those southern prisons. 
Monday, Ajwil 7, 1890. — Mr. Robert Rayner of this 
city read a paper on "Means of Communication." The 
lecturer said that these were a criterion of the civilization 
of a country, and good artificial means are found where the 
civilization is high and good. In one hundred and fifty 
years great progress has been made, but only in the last 
half of that period has land communication become gen- 
eral. The ancient Romans built fine roads, views of which 
remain to this day. They generally made them of con- 
crete three feet in depth. It was thought their durability 
was partly owing to the lime used ^vhich remained, after 
