80 



of the correctness of the history given by the citizens of Brandon as 

 to the existence of ice when the well was first dug are now dissipated 

 by the direct researches of this committee, and by the actual discov- 

 ery of the frozen stratum, and of bands of clear ice seventy-two feet 

 west of the well, in the strata of boulders and clay. This fact, wit- 

 nessed by one of the committee, and by numerous respectable gentle- 

 men of Brandon, is now placed beyond a doubt. 



Since it appears that the nature and situation of the strata of earth, 

 gravel, and boulders around this well, causes the low temperature of 

 the winter months to be preserved in the well through the summer, it 

 is probable that, by imitating this condition of things in the construc- 

 tion of a well in a similar region, we could make a well that would 

 freeze in the winter, and retain its frozen condition through the 

 summer. The experiment might require two or three years for its 

 fair trial, in order to afford time for the translation of the waves of 

 heat. 



By correspondence with Mr. George Sidney Camp, of Tioga, we 

 have learned all that can be now known concerning the frozen well 

 of that place, and also that, Its walls having caved In, it would be 

 useless for the committee to visit the place, since no additional Infor- 

 mation can be now obtained without a reconstruction of the well, 

 which would be quite expensive, Its depth being more than seventy 

 feet, and it having been excavated In a stratum of boulders like those 

 of the Brandon frozen well. 



We think that the causes assigned as those which effected the 

 freezing of the well In Brandon are equally applicable to that at 

 Tioga. 



The same theory will apply to the cold wells In Connecticut, which 

 are at a temperature below the mean of the climate of that State, 

 and yet do not freeze. 



It is hardly necessary to add, that the occurrence of ice in iron 

 mines and caves where snow drifts abundantly Into them, is not simi- 

 lar to the case of the Brandon well ; and the occurrence of masses of 

 ice under the shadow of crags of rocks, as at Granville, Nova Scotia, 

 and of sheets of ice below the turf in Isle Royale, Lake Superior, are 

 also of a different class, and require a different explanation from 

 those applicable to frozen wells. Hence we do not feel called upon 

 to enter upon the explanation of these phenomena at this time. 



The committee are under obligations to David Buekland, Esq., for 

 elaborate tabular statements of the monthly mean temperature of 

 Brandon, from 1853 to 1861, Inclusive. They regret to state that, 

 owing to the burning of his house, all the tables he kept for the past 

 year are lost, with the exception of that for the month of November, 

 1861. These tables are appended to this report. 



