VOL. L.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 277 



with a proper instrument, to let out the aqueous humour ; and then apply such 

 agglutinant and contracting collyria, as may reduce the distended coats and veS' 

 sels to their former size. This operation should be performed before the humours 

 are vitiated, the sight lost, the vessels in a state of suppuration, and the coats of 

 the eye too far extended ; for at that time nothing less than extirpation can be 

 of use. Professor Nuck, in his Tractatus de Ductibus Oculorum Aquosis, p. 

 120, relates the success he had in curing a young man by 5 repeated punctures, 

 and a strict observance in a proper -use of all the non-naturals. 



CII. On the Heat of the Weather in Georgia. By H. Ellis, Esq. Governor of 



Georgia^ and F. R. S, p. 754. i 



One cannot here sit down to any thing that requires much application but with 

 extreme reluctance; for such is the debilitating quality of our violent heats at 

 this season (July), that an inexpressible languor enervates every faculty, and 

 renders even the thought of exercising them painful. It is now (writes Mr. 

 Ellis) about 3 o'clock ; the sun bears nearly s.w., and I am writing in a piazza, 

 open at each end, on the n.e. side of my house, perfectly in the shade : a small 

 breeze at s.e. blows freely through it; no buildings are nearer to reflect the heat 

 than 6o yards : yet in a thermometer hanging by me, made by Mr. Bird, and 

 compared by the late Mr. George Graham with an approved one of his own, 

 the mercury stands at 102. Twice it has risen this summer to the same height; 

 viz. on the 28th of June, and the 11th of July. Several times it has been at 

 100, and for many days successively at 98 ; and did not in the nights sink below 

 89. It is highly probable that the inhabitants of this town breathe a hotter air 

 than any other people on the face of the earth. The greatest heat we had last 

 year was but 92, and that but once : from 84 to 90 were the usual variations ; 

 but this is reckoned an extraordinary hot summer. The weather-wise of this 

 country say it forebodes a hurricane ; for it has always been remarked, that these 

 tempests have been preceded by continual and uncommon heats. I must ac- 

 quaint you however that the heats we are subject to here are more intense than 

 in any other parts of the province, the town of Savannah being situated on a 

 sandy eminence, and sheltered all round with high woods. Yet it is remarkable 

 that this very spot, from its height and dryness, is reckoned equally healthy with 

 any other in the province. 



I have frequently walked 100 yards under an umbrella, with a thermometer 

 suspended from it by a thread to the height of my nostrils, when the mercury 

 has risen to 105; which is prodigious. At the same time I have confined this 

 instrument close to the hottest part of my body, and have been astonished to 

 observe that it has subsided several degrees. Indeed I never could raise the 

 mercury above 97 with the heat of my body. I have traversed a great part of 



