[ »5 ] 
which would have been evaporated to about half the 
quantity in a fornight’s time, the fpirituous part (hoot- 
ing up the plumb-line, and Tides of the glafs like 
coral ; but perfectly white. What remained would 
then freeze, but not before. At the beginning of 
the winter I hung a fmall vial with about a tea-fpoon- 
ful of proof fpirits of wine by the thermometer, on 
the outtide of the obfervatory, and when I had well 
corked it up, dropped Tome water on the cork, 
which was indantly frozen to ice, and thereby fealed 
the vial, in a manner hermetically. This, though 
it hung all the winter, never froze ; nor, that I could 
perceive, altered its fluidity in the lead:. 
It was now almod impofiible to deep an hour to- 
gether, more efpecially on very cold nights, without 
being awakened by the cracking of the beams in the 
houle, which were rent by the prodigious expanfive 
power of the frod. It was very ealy to midake 
them for the guns on the top of the houfe, which 
are three pounders. But thofe are nothing to what 
we frequently hear from the rocks up the country* 
and along the coad; thefe often burding with a report 
equal to that of many heavy artillery fired together, 
and the fplinters are thrown to an amazing didance. 
On Sunday, March 19th, it thaw r ed in the fun, 
for the fird time, and on the 26th it thawed in reality. 
The yard of the fa&ory was that day almod covered 
with water. After this, it continued to thaw every 
day about noon when the fun was out; and by the 
23d of April, the ground was in many places bare. 
On the 26th it rained very fad, almod the whole 
night, which was the fird rain we had after Odtober 
the 3d, 1768. It was really furprizing next morn- 
