454 



DR R. E. SCORESBY-JACKSON ON THE TEMPERATURE 



M. Ernest Baudrimont made a series of observations at the Grande-Grille, 

 Vichy, to ascertain what changes mineral waters are subject to in their compo- 

 sition from day to day. At the same time he recorded the temperature of the 

 water, and on several days in September 1850, he notes it as follows ; showing 

 an extreme range in eleven days of '80 Cent. = l''-44 Fahr.* 



Day of Month 



Temperature, Centigrade. 



Day of Month. 



Temperature, Centigrade 



3 



33'33 



9 



32-80 



5 



33-33 



12 



33-25 



7 



33 



14 



33-60 



Whenever I had an opportunity I put the question, whether the temperature 

 of the springs varied from day to day, from season to season, or from year to year. 

 The answer that I received was almost without exception a negative When I 

 asked the question of one of my professional brethren, the repl}^ was often a little 

 modified, ^rirzV// variations being generally admitted : but when I put the question 

 to an ouvrier attached to any of the establishments, he invariably betrayed 

 his sense of the importance of uniformity of temperature by a most emphatic 

 denial. The prevailing opinion in the Pyrenees touching the variability of tem- 

 perature of the springs is precisely what has been stated by Dr Lambron, in 

 his comprehensive work (Les Pyrenees, et Les Eaux Thermales Sulphurees 

 de Bagneres-de-Luchon.) He says : — " The variations of temperature to which 

 well secured {Men capUes) thermo-mineral springs are liable are generally 

 so trifling (de 1 a 2 degres), that we may consider the temperature which 

 they bear from the interior of the earth to be constant ; and we may attri- 

 bute the variations to fortuitous causes, operating either in the interior of 

 the globe (as earthquakes), or far more commonly near the surface, as by 

 the infiltration and admixture of surface water. And these variations are 

 so transient, that at the end of a few days, their normal temperature is 

 restored" (p. 414). 



Suppose it were commonly admitted, however, that slight variations of tem- 

 perature do occur from season to season, important as that may be to the physician 

 and his patient, still the larger c^uestion, as to a regular and permanent loss or 

 increase of temperature remains to be answered. M. Filhol remarks, that the 

 changes of temperature are not alwa^^s in one direction ; he found the same 

 springs to be sometimes a little above, sometimes a little below their normal 

 temperature. It is possible, therefore, that temperatures taken at long intervals 

 may differ, to a certain extent, without there being any really permanent change. 

 If one observer record the temperature when the spring is abnormally low, and 

 another when it is abnormally high ; or one in winter and another in summer, a 

 difference of several degrees may be obtained, without the water having per- 



* Annales de la Societe d'Hydrologie Medicale de Paris, t. ii. p. 251. 



