116 Dr. Hale on the Meteorological Journal 
equally unfounded, which has often been maintained, that the 
spring advances more rapidly, in proportion to the temperature 
of the whole year, than it did formerly. 
It is impossible to ascertain from the journal with entire ac- 
curacy the comparative frequency and duration of the storms in 
the several years. But on a careful comparison of a consider- 
able number of years in different periods, I do not find that Dr. 
Holyoke’s opinion which I have quoted, of the diminished fre- 
quency of long storms, in the later years, receives much sup- 
port from the daily record of the state of the weather. In look- 
ing back upon past years, the severe storms are among the more 
prominent events which have made the greatest impression upon 
the memory, while the intermediate species of time are forgot- 
ten. Hence probably it is, that the opinion has so extensively 
prevailed, that our climate has undergone a progressive meliora- 
tion; although we can find no evidence of the change, in au- 
thentic records of events. 
In the preceding calculations I have taken no notice of the 
two additional years 1822 and 1823, because, from the different 
manner it which the journal was kept, there are no means of 
comparing them accurately with the others. But after making 
allowance for the difference of time of the observations, it ap- 
pears that the last of those years, 1823, was much colder than 
the mean of the whole period of thirty-eight years. In that 
year the thermometer fell to the freezing point several times in 
every month, except the three summer months. In the six 
months from the middle of October, 1822, to the middle of April, 
1823, there were but thirty-three days in which it did not freeze ; 
and in the four months from the first of December to the end of 
March, there were but four such days. 
