OE 
PROFESSOR FORBES ON THE CLIMATE OF EDINBURGH. 305 
TABLE XV.—COoNTAINING THE SEASONS ARRANGED ACCORDING TO THE PRICE OF OATS, 
BEGINNING WITH THE CHEAPEST. 
1} 1849 9.| 1848 | 17.| 1802 || 25.| (1803 || 33.| (1804 | 41.) 1836 | 49.| 1816 
Zi tio7 || 10.| 1796) 18.| 18387 || 26.)< 1819 | 34. {192 42.| 1838 | 50.| 1846 
3 | 180 11.| ( 1840 | 19.} 1848 || 27.| | 1831 || 35.| | 1889 | 43.) 1813 | 51.| 1807 
4.) | 1850 || 12. { 1841 | 20.; 1820 || 28.; 1824 || 36.) 1795 || 44.| (1811 | 52.) 1799 
5| 1798 || 13.| (1822 || 21.) ( 1829 || 29.| 1810 | 37.| (1806 || 45.|< 1817 || 53.| 1809 
6.) 1832 | 14.|< 1834 || 22. { 1844 || 30.| 1847 || 38.| | 1823 | 46.| | 1818 |) 54.| 1812 
7, 1815 || 15.| (1835 || 23.| 1801 |) 31.) 1814 | 39./) 1830 | 47.| 1808 || 55.| 1800 
8 aoe 
1842 || 16.) 1821 | 24.| 1827 || 32.; 1825 || 40.| | 18465 | 48.) 1826 



















75. If this Table be compared with similar ones of the different meteorological 
data in the earlier part of this paper, the complete discordance from all or any of 
these will be perceived. It is true that the cold years of 1799, 1800, and 1812, 
certainly coincide with periods of dear corn; but, on the other hand, we find 
them in close proximity with 1826 and 1846, the two hottest summers of the 
record. On the other hand, the cheapest years of the whole, 1849 and 1797, will 
be seen from Table X. to have been cold, late, and rainy. I have in that Table 
included the character of the season as one of cheapness or of scarcity, in 
anticipation of this comparison. 
76. It might be suggested that the abundance, or the contrary, of the crop of 
any year might be expected rather to influence the prices of the next than of 
that season ; but this supposition does not seem to reconcile the anomaly. ‘Thus, 
the cold years 1797 and 1849 were not only cheap years, but were succeeded by 
cheap years; and the hot summers of 1826 and 1846 produced not only high 
prices, but were succeeded by years of only average prices. 
77. With a view to test impartially the possible connection between prices 
and these elements of climate, I assumed that it might be possible to represent 
the price of oats in any year by a linear function of the following variables—viz., 
the mean temperature of the year, the temperature of the hottest month, and the 
fall of rain. I accordingly wrote out (without selection) those data for the follow- 
ing years of those for which I possessed complete records—viz., the three dearest, 
the three cheapest, the three years having the highest mean temperature, the three 
having the lowest mean, the three having the hottest summer months, and the 
three wettest years. I took the mean of the three years of the same description, 
and thus obtained six equations of a linear form, each containing three factors as 
multipliers of the meteorological elements, which factors were to be determined. 
It will show the extreme anomaly of the results that the mean of the three 
years of most rain showed a price of oats rather below the average, that the three 
hottest years were above the average. The six equations being solved separately 
VOL. XXII. PART IL. 4Y¥ 
