40-1: THE CLIMATE OF IRELAND, AND 



vation ; while a greater deficiency is fatal to the crop. The case 

 is somewhat better in the southern half of the island, and some- 

 what worse in the northern ; and we are therefore justified in 

 concluding, that it is contrary to the rules of all sound experience 

 to attempt the culture of this cereal in Ireland, except in the most 

 favoured localities. 



In the preceding discussion I have considered only the relation 

 of temperature to the culture of wheat. I have not adverted to the 

 frequently destructive en 3 ect of the autumn rains, which set in with 

 the fall of temperature, and often before the harvest is gathered. 

 Time will not permit me to discuss the corresponding questions 

 for the other cereals ; nor to advert to the fact, which is now be- 

 ginning to gain general acceptance, that the climate of this island, 

 while it is unfavourable to the higher cereals, is adapted in a pecu- 

 liar manner to the cultivation of root-crops, and of fodder.* I 

 hasten to say a few words, before I conclude, of the effects of 

 climate in general, and especially of our own climate, upon the 

 health of man. 



We are all familiar with the command of the physician to the 

 patient, " to change the air ;" and most of us know something, 

 although probably less than the importance of the subject demands, 

 of the salubrity or insalubrity of different districts. 



Of all the meteorological elements, that which exerts the most 

 direct effect upon human health is the temperature of the air ; and 

 in this respect the two forms of organized life are subject to one 

 law. We all know the effects upon the bodily frame of an ex- 

 treme cold in winter, and of harsh winds in spring ; and some of 

 us are obliged to leave our homes and daily occupations, and to 

 take refuge from these dangers in the more genial climates of the 

 south, f 



M. Quetelet, in his important work " On Man," has brought 

 together many curious facts connected with the influence of climate 

 upon human life. Dividing Europe into three zones which we 



* The turnip depends chiefly on a proper supply of moisture during the summer 

 months ; and it is injured by much heat. Accordingly, moist and cool summers such 

 as are frequent in Ireland are the fittest for this vegetable. The same rule applies 

 to grass. 



t The connexion of the mortality with the cold of winter is very distinctly marked 

 in the weekly returns of the Registrar-general. In the severe frost of Christmas, 1860, 

 the increase in the number of deaths in London was forty daily, being greater than 

 the increase caused by cholera. 



