312 WEATHER. 



LXIL 



THERE were some circumstances attending the 

 remarkable frost in January, 1776, so singular and 

 striking, that a short detail of them may not be 

 unacceptable. 



The most certain way to be exact will be to 

 copy the passages from my journal, which were 

 taken from time to time as things occurred. But 

 it may be proper previously to remark, that the 

 first week in January was uncommonly wet, and 

 drowned with vast rains from every quarter : from 

 whence may be inferred, as there is great reason 

 to believe is the case, that intense frosts seldom 

 take place till the earth is perfectly glutted and 

 chilled with water l ; and hence dry autumns are 

 seldom followed by rigorous winters. 



January 7th. Snow driving all the day, which 

 was followed by frost, sleet, and some snow, till 

 the 12th, when a prodigious mass overwhelmed 

 all the works of men, drifting over the tops of the 

 gates and filling the hollow lanes. 



On the 14th, the writer was obliged to be much 

 abroad ; and thinks he never before or since 

 has encountered such rugged Siberian weather. 

 Many of the narrow roads were now filled above 

 the tops of the hedges ; through which the snow 

 was driven into most romantic and grotesque 

 shapes, so striking to the imagination as not to be 

 seen without wonder and pleasure. The poultry 



1 The autumn preceding January 1768, was very wet, 

 and particularly the month of September, during which 

 there fell at Lyndon, in the county of Rutland, six inches 

 and a half of rain. And the terrible long frost in 1739-40 

 set in after a rainy season, and when the springs were very 

 high. 



