TRANSACTIONS. 31 
greatly retarded the work of the harvest, and caused in many cases 
serious damage to the grain crops. In the other autumn months 
there was an unusual decline of temperature, the mean of October 
being only 45° and that of November 39°7°, as compared with 
49°8° last year in the former month and 42°1° in the latter. As 
early as the 8th October the higher hills in Dumfriesshire and 
over Scotland had a covering of snow, and on the night of the 
11th or morning of the 12th the thermometer registered 8° of 
frost. Northerly and easterly winds prevailed in both these 
months, and in November the sky was for the most part overcast, 
with a consequent minimum of sunshine, which made the weather 
both cold and gioomy. October had 10 nights of frost, with an 
aggregate of 28°, and November 13 nights, with an aggregate of 
47°. The total number of days throughout the year in which the 
thermumeter was at or below the freezing point was 96, and the 
aggregrate degrees of frost 360. In 1886 the number of days was 
112, and the aggregate 536°. So far, however, was the excess of 
cold this year counterbalanced by the unusual heat of June and 
July that the mean temperature of the year was 1° higher than 
that of 1886, viz., 47°2° as compared with 46°2° in the latter year 
Comparing this with the mean temperature of other parts of Scot- 
land, as reported this week in some of the newspapers, I find that 
Ardrossan had a mean temperature for the past year of 47-3°; 
Leith, of 47:2°; Aberdeen, of 46°4°; and Wick, of 45°3°. It may 
be interesting to note, as showing the difference between a northern 
and southern temperature, that the mean annual temperature of 
Greenwich for the last fifty years is 518°. Mr Dudgeon of Cargen 
reports a mean for the year of 46:2°. How this difference from 
the temperature of Dumfries is to be explained I cannot say ; but 
Thave repeatedly observed that both the highest maximum and 
the lowest minimum temperatures of the month at Cargen are, as 
a rule, lower than those reported at Dumfries by one or two 
degrees, and sometimes more. There must be different local con- 
ditions affecting the temperature to give rise to this difference in 
places so near one another. The mean of 47:2°, though above the 
mean of the previous year, is still somewhat under the usual average. 
Rainfali—There were 181 days on which rain or snow fell 
(rain, 170; snow, 11); on 34 of which, however, the fall did not 
exceed one hundredth of an inch ; total, 30°99 inches. In 1886 
rain or snow fell on 224 days, with a total of 41:13 inches. The 
heaviest fall in 24 hours in 1887 occurred between 9 4.M. of 6th 
