4G2 GREAT COLD IN MAINE. 



thermometer, for a short time, to 33° (Fahrenheit) below the 

 zero; and again, on the 26th — 27th, for a much longer time. 

 .But the sky, on the. last occasion, became cloudy at 3 A. M. 

 and stopped short our career, or I should have frozen quick- 

 silver by a natural process, for the first time in the United States, 

 and for the first time any where in so low a latitude as 44° 16' 

 by the side of tide waters; that is, at the level of the sea. Quick- 

 silver, by Mr. Hutchins' experiments at. Hudson's Bay, as ex- 

 plained by Mr. Cavendish, and confirmed by various others, 

 freezes at — 384-°; and I had the thermometer at — 36° or — 37° on 

 the surface of the snow; consequently, had darkness continued 

 without clouds, by day break I should have had .my requisite 

 temperature at the surface of the snow, though I did not ex- 

 pect more than — 36° in the air. I had prepared diminutive cups 

 of fine writing paper, of a size to hold each a globule of quick- 

 silver; and tools were ready cooled to strike, in order to obtain 

 a proof of malleability. — In all this cold weather our female 

 invalids were riding about the country, and our stages and 

 town patroles (of which in my turn I am one) by night. On 

 the two coldest nights, I sat up with my son, and wore neither 

 hat, nor gloves, nor great coat, nor boots. I observed with three 

 thermometers made by Blunt, the king's instrument-maker in 

 London, a fourth by Jones, and a fifth by an Englishman (who 

 supplies some Italians at Boston) and which proved my third best 

 instrument. At mid-day on the 26th wc had a violent wind, with 

 the thermometer 7° below the zero; against which our ladies 

 rode, without inconvenience, in a sleigh ; other thermometers 

 in the neighbourhood, including one by Adams, corroborated 

 the above. This winter, till lately, has not differed from any 

 common cold winter in Europe. 



