69 



freezing point, and not more than a week after it was again 

 very cold, with sleet and snow. 



Yet it is marvellous how things right themselves in the end ; 

 how, notwitlistanding all these strange anomalies, heat and 

 cold, wet and drought, in the long run compensate each other, 

 causing a return of nearly the same averages for each season, 

 when periods of years, say decades, are compared together. 

 It is sometimes thought that the seasons are very different 

 from what they were formerly, and we hear of " old-fashioned 

 winters," or, as Mrs. Piozzi writes, of the " heats of a sum- 

 mer long forgotten in this country ; " but such remarks more 

 often arise out of an imperfect recollection of the past, than 

 result from any comparison of trustworthy records. More- 

 over, we have few records to turn to for any accurate statement 

 of what the true temperature was at any very distant day from 

 the present. Extremes of weather, and extreme seasons, seem 

 always to have occurred at intervals, and doubtless will con- 

 tinue to do so. It is now fifty years since the hot summer 

 that Mrs. Piozzi speaks of, and I have mentioned several 

 others between that time and the present ; some as hot as the 

 one we have just experienced. At the same time it is fair to 

 mention that Mr. Glaisher, after a careful inspection of the 

 Greenwich Registers, which have probably been kept for a 

 longer period of years than any others, and kept more 

 accurately, has come to the conclusion that our climate has 

 altered in the last hundred years, the temperature of the 

 year being 2° higher now than it was then. This difference, 

 however, is most perceptible in the winter months, though 

 " every month in the year seems to be somewhat warmer 

 than before." * 



Whether this slight secular change is due to the same 

 causes, continuing slowly to operate, which brought about 



• "Proceedings of Brit. Meteor. Soc," vol. ii., p. 365. 



