OF tiELBORNE. 299 



LETTER LXL 



TO THE HONOURABLE DAINES BARRINGTON. 



INGE the weather of a district is undoubtedly 

 part of its natural history, I shall make no 

 further apology for the four following letters, 

 which will contain many particulars con- 

 cerning some of the great frosts and a few 

 respecting some very hot summers, that have distinguished 

 themselves from the rest during the course of my obser- 

 vations. 



As the frost in January, 1768., was, for the small time it 

 lasted, the most severe that we had then known for many years, 

 and was remarkably injurious to evergreens, some account 

 of its rigour, and reason of its ravages, may be useful, and 

 not unacceptable to persons that delight in planting and 

 ornamenting; and may particularly become a work that 

 professes never to lose sight of utility. 



For the last two or three days of the former year there 

 were considerable falls of snow, which lay deep and uniform 

 on the ground, without any drifting, wrapping up the more 

 humble vegetation in perfect security. From the first day 

 to the fifth of the new year more snow succeeded; but from 

 that day the air became entirely clear ; and the heat of the 

 sun about noon had a considerable influence in sheltered 

 situations. 



It was in such an aspect that the snow on the author's 

 evergreens was melted every day, and frozen intensely 

 every night; so that the laurustines, bays, laurels, and 

 arbutuses looked, in three or four days, as if they had been 

 burned in the fire; while a neighbour's plantation of the 

 same kind, in a high cold situation, where the snow was 

 never melted at all, remained uninjured. 



From hence I would infer, that it is the repeated melting 

 and freezing of the snow that is so fatal to vegetation, 



