138 EFFECTS OF FROST. 



cause of her distress, it appeared that she had been making her 

 breakfast on some offal scraps of meat, which had been thrown 

 there ; and the place being wet, and the thermometer at the 

 time being fifteen degrees below freezing, her feet had actually 

 frozen to the ground, and a minute or two elapsed before she 

 could extricate herself from her unpleasant situation. One 

 other instance we have met with, which is stated by the 

 writer to be a positive fact, and as, in our view of the case, it 

 is by no means unlikely to have occurred, we give it. A 

 peasant in the mountainous part of the South of France, 

 observing a great number of wild Ducks settled on the ice of 

 a small river that was frozen over, fired into the midst of them, 

 and was surprised to find that not one of them took to flight. 

 On going up, he found that, owing to the severity of the frost, 

 they were not only completely fastened to the ice by their 

 feet, but that nearly one half were frozen to death. The 

 above anecdotes will appear less improbable, when we consider 

 how rapidly, under favourable circumstances, even in our 

 comparatively temperate winters, ice is formed, and how unex- 

 pectedly birds or animals unaware of it, might in consequence 

 be imprisoned. It is easy to form ice to a considerable extent, 

 in a few minutes, if water is poured over a level surface so 

 that none shall escape ; for instance, over a wide floor or 

 plain, smoothed with Roman cement, flooded to the depth of 

 less than a quarter of an inch. A thin coating of water thus 

 applied, will, even if the thermometer is scarcely lower than 

 the freezing-point, almost immediately become a sheet of ice, 

 and if repeated two or three times, will form a covering 

 capable of bearing the heaviest weight without giving way. 

 This was actually practised with success on three successive 

 days in November, near Glasgow, for the purpose of preparing 

 a perfectly smooth sheet of water on a roughly-frozen pond, 

 for a game, called, in Scotland, a curling match. One-eighth 

 of an inch in thickness was found sufficient ; it immediately 

 froze, and when the game was over at night, a similar additional 

 coating was poured over it, for fresh use. 



We have seen that the common food of the Hawk tribe con- 



