34 Transactions. 



under average. With these facts in view, it is not to be 

 wondered at that the mean temperature of the year, taken as a 

 whole — viz., 46 degs. — is considerably below the normal. It is 

 the lowest annual mean recorded at this station since observa- 

 tions were commenced in 1886. In that year it was 46-2 degs. 

 During the other years the annual mean ranged from 46"5 to 48"1 

 degs. The deficiency in the past year appears both in the mean 

 maxima and in the mean minima — that is, both in the day and 

 night temperatures — which for 1892 were mean max. 53'3 degs. 

 and mean min. 37-1 degs., as compared with an average for the 

 previous five years of 54-6 degs. and 40-1 degs. This shows a 

 deficiency of warm days, but in a much greater degree a pre- 

 ponderance of cold nights. Although the number of nights on 

 which the thermometer fell below the freezing point is not very 

 much above the noiinal, the number of aggregate degrees of frost 

 — viz., 557 degs. — -is greatly in excess of that of any previous 

 year, so far as my observations go, these having ranged from 193 

 degs. in 1889 to about 500 degs. in 1886. This serves to show 

 the intensity of the frost which marked the winter months of 

 1892, December alone showing an aggregate of 173 degs. And 

 further evidences of this are supplied by the freezing over of the 

 river Nith about Ciiristraas, with ice strong enough to bear 

 skaters, from the Caul to Albany Place, and the continuance of 

 this up to the 5th or 6th January ; and also by the number of 

 water-pipes that wen; burst. There were only two months in 

 which the mean temperature exceeded the average — May and 

 November — in each case only to the extent of 1 deg. ; while 

 June was about average, and all the other months below it to an 

 amount ranging from 1 to 4^ or 5 degs. The year on the whole, 

 therefore, has been exceptionally cold, as the annual mean clearly 

 indicates ; and, so far as reports that have appeared enable us to 

 judge, this deficiency of heat seems to have been general over the 

 whole country. I observe that Mr Dudgeon reports the mean 

 temperature of the past year at Cargen as 45 '3 degs., being more 

 than 2 degs. below the average and the lowest for 33 years. A 

 meteorological correspondent in the Scotsman gives the following 

 report of the annual means for 1892 in different parts of the 

 country : Wick, in the extreme north, 44*1 degs. ; Aberdeen, 

 44-6 degs. ; Edinburgh, 45-6 degs. ; Leith, 46-3 degs. ; Ardrossan. 

 46-4 degs. ; Loughborough, in central England, 46*9 degs; Livei'- 



