300 DE, R. E. SCORESBY-JACKSON 



as in the United Kingdom, there have been many physicians during the present 

 century, wlio by their labours have enriched tliis peculiar branch of medicine ; 

 and if I do not frequently quote their writings, it is neither from a want of 

 respect to them individually, nor from a desire to underrate what they have 

 accomplished, but simply because my time is very limited ; and, further, because 

 I think it will tend far more to the progress of the inquiry to pursue my own 

 researches independently of any other investigations. It is well known that 

 the influence of external causes upon the constitutions of living creatures differs 

 materially with locality. These causes are not only numerous of themselves, 

 but they are moreover capable of producing an infinite variety of I'esults, 

 according to their several combinations. Their effects are as distinct in different 

 countries, as are the features of men of different nations. Therefore, conclusions 

 derived from investigations pursued here can have no dependence upon the 

 knowledge acquired by physicians in other countries ; nor can any discrepancy 

 which may be observed between the results of such several investigations serve 

 to impugn the accuracy of individual deductions. It is quite possible that the 

 results evoked by Casper in Berlin, Quetelet in Brussels, Boudin in Paris, 

 Emerson in Philadelphia, and Guy in London, as well as those by the Registrars- 

 General of the United Kingdom, may differ widely in many essential points, and 

 yet the inferences of each observer be correct in themselves. The same may be 

 said of the researches of Sir James Clark, Cless, Edmonds, Emerson, Foissac, 

 Francis, Fuchs, Haviland, Hallee, Hirsch, Keith Johnston, Lombard, Madler, 

 Marc d'Espine, Martin, Meyer, Milne-Edwards, Muhry, Ransome, Rigden, 

 Schubler, Tripe, Villerme, and of many other careful observers. JNIy object is 

 to examine the relations which exist between the weather and the health of a 

 community as closely as I may find it practicable to do so ; and in pursuing this 

 inquiry, my desire is to divest myself of all foregone theory, and to make the 

 facts which I have collated speak for themselves. 



We have the strongest indication of the utility of such investigations in the 

 fact, that, whether we do or do not possess a knowledge of the etiological and 

 therapeutic influence of meteorological phenomena, we invariably act as if we were 

 most intimate with the subject. Delicate persons crave for, and physicians often 

 recommend, change of climate, which in many instances is a term convertible with 

 change of weather, though it often means nothing more than change of scenery 

 and of mental or physical occupation. If it be a good thing for a sick man to 

 change his residence, it must be a proper thing for him to know what it is that he 

 is avoiding, and what it is that he is to acquire in exchange for it in another place 

 This must remain an exceedingly difficult question to solve, until we have statistics 

 from every health resort, showing the correlations of weather and disease in each. 

 We are not to assume that because certain conditions of weather, as indicated by 

 meteorological instruments, in this country are opposed to recovery from certain 



