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VIII. Account of the Method of making Ice at Benares. In a 
Letter to William Marsden, Esq. F. R. S. from John Lloyd 
Williams, Esq. of Benares. 
Read February 14, 1793. 
DEAR SIR, 
As the method of making ice in this country, where the 
thermometer, during part of the year, stands at from 95 to 
ioo° in the shade, has something peculiar in it, I trust the fol- 
lowing description of the process will not be unacceptable. 
You know that ice is made in India during the months of 
December, January, and part of February ; but I believe it 
has generally been considered as necessary to the congelation 
of the water, that it should have been boiled. However, I can 
now assure you, as a fact within my own observation for 
these nine years past, that a large quantity of ice has been 
made at this place every year, without any preparation 
whatever ; and I have often seen ice of an inch and 
quarter thick, notwithstanding I do not conceive that the 
atmosphere, at that time, was sufficiently cold to produce the 
effect ; for I have frequently placed a thermometer, with the 
naked bulb on the straw, amidst the freezing vessels during 
the night, and on inspecting it between five and six o'clock 
in the morning (at which time the ice-makers informed me 
the cold was most intense), I never found it below 35 0 . I 
