9 
APPLICATION OF HEAT. 
As from the extraordinary character of the weather throughout an entire year, 
commencing with November, 1844, it was judged right to offer remarks upon the 
peculiar phenomena of that period on more than one occasion, it now does not 
appear irrelevant to take a cursory notice of the last month which has closed the 
year 1845 ; and particularly, as no greater contrast could be imagined, than that 
presented by the two Decembers of the years alluded to. When we reflect upon 
the irregular vicissitudes of season in our insular climates, we perceive the futility 
of all prognostications which are founded upon regular planetary movements. The 
moon is known to perform its rotations in certain definite periods ; yet how fallible 
is every prediction which takes for its foundation the lunar phases ! 
Let us only retrace the whole of December, 1844, and consider its fierce cold, its 
gloom, its fogs, its almost entire absence of rain, even in the smallest quantities, 
the general paucity of sunlight ; and then compare a meteoric condition so extra- 
ordinary, with that of the month just elapsed. The result, we opine, will be the 
abandonment of predictions, and the substitution of a theory which refers all 
meteoric transitions, mutations, and irregularities, to certain electro-magnetic 
disturbances in the air, and below the surface of the earth, which change the 
condition of water and watery vapour, in a manner not discernible or appreciable by 
instruments, yet arbitrary and local to a degree perfectly surprising. In fact, it is 
scarcely safe to quote the weather or temperature of any locality, since it is notorious 
that according to tables founded upon instrumental observations, in places not 
remote from each other, and close to the metropolis, the given results are so opposed, 
as to lead to no correct conclusions whatsoever. 
When therefore we state, that, throughout the past month we have observed and 
registered only seven rimy frosts, with not one entire day wherein the instrument 
descended so low as thirty-five degrees at its maximum; that there were twenty 
days in which rain fell more or less, and on several occasions in very great profusion ; 
and, nevertheless, that the sun has frequently been brilliant as in March, and the 
mid-day temperature genial as in spring, we can only claim credence of the facts as 
purely local. The point of interest is simply this — that while all must admit the 
regularity and beautiful harmony of the planetary movements ; the concurrence of 
four (rarely five) monthly lunations ; the all-but precisely corresponding length of 
days and nights, and the identity of solar altitude — we find two seasons, at exactly 
the same periods of the year, totally at variance in every important meteoric 
phenomenon ! 
These remarks are penned on the first days of the new year, when the open 
garden presents primroses of various colours in bloom, or expanding their blossoms ; 
oxlips, particularly strong and highly tinted ; violets quite redolent of odour : and 
VOL. XIII. NO. CXLV. C 
