318 Meteorological Journal for March. 
adhesive to the trees or to the ground, and was the first we 
had had here during the past winter: it again snowed in the 
night, and by the morning it had covered Portsdown Hill. 
Snow also fell here on the 26th, which was the coldest day 
and night since the 28th of last January. Heavy snow-showers 
and boisterous winds were also experienced in other parts 
of the country, particularly to the northward. Early in the 
morning of the 27th, the ice was one-third of an inch thick, 
and in the mornings of the 30th and 31st, it was one-eighth of 
an inch thick. This ungenial weather was a seasonable check 
upon the budding of the fruit-trees, and has therefore made 
the spring rather backward; but this will no doubt be bene- 
ficial in the end. An early spring, with variable weather, is 
much dreaded in this latitude, as the frosty nights which al- 
most invariably ensue, have a destructive effect upon the young 
fruit, and vegetation. ‘The mean temperature of the external 
air this month, is one-third of a degree less than that of last 
month! The maximum temperature occurred in the night of 
the 6th, instead of in the day. Spring water seems to have 
arrived at its minimum temperature, as it is now at a stand. 
On the morning of the 3lst two beautiful parhelia, and a 
fine solar halo appeared between 8 and 9 o’clock. ‘The first 
arhelion on the south side of the sun was visible from eight 
till half-past, one degree without the exterior colour of the 
solar halo, and 23 degrees distant from the sun’s centre: it 
varied in shape, being sometimes circular, at other times gib- 
bous and oblong, according to the motion and density of the 
almost invisible vapour in which it was formed by the reflected 
rays of the sun; and the orange, light yellow, and blue co- 
lours with which it was embellished, were sufficiently vivid to 
be traced through a passing attenuated czrrostratus cloud. 
The other parhelion on the north side of the sun, which ap- 
peared from half-past eight till a quarter to nine, was not so 
bright in its primitive colours, in consequence of the most 
dense part of the vapour having passed off by means of a fresh 
wind from the North-west; but its distance was the same from 
the sun’s centre, viz. 23 degrees. ‘The solar halo was well- 
defined, its horizontal diameter was 44 degrees, and its whole 
area presented a lake colour bounded by a turbid red, whilst 
that part of the sky in its vicinity was gray. 
The atmospheric and meteoric phenomena that have come 
within our observations, this month, are two parhelia, two so- 
lar and two lunar halos, three meteors, one rainbow, and thir- 
teen gales, of wind, or days on which they have prevailed, 
namely, one from the North, seven from North-east, one from 
South-east, and four from the South-west. 
Numerical 
