2i 6 Dr Currie's Account of the 
less striking. It would seem, however, that after a person is 
long chilled in cold water, the first effect of passing through 
the external air into the warm bath, is first a fall of heat in 
the air, and after this a still greater fall in the warm bath, 
followed, however, by a speedy rise. 
The air and the water being equally cold, and both 45 0 
or under, I found the loss of heat in passing from the one 
to the other to be regulated in the following way. 
1. If, instead of being exposed naked to the wind previous 
to immersion in the water, the body was kept warm by a 
flannel covering, the mercury fell much less on the first 
plunge. 
2. If, after plunging into the water, the person continued 
in it only a minute or two, a subsequent fall of the mercury 
did not always take place, on his emerging into the air. On 
the contrary there was sometimes a rise on such occasions in 
the mercury, especially if the atmosphere was at rest. 
3. In one instance, after continuing in the water fifteen 
minutes, on rising into the air in a perfect calm, though during 
a frost, there was little or no seeming diminution of the heat ; 
while exposure under similar circumstances, with a north-east 
wind blowing sharply, though the air was many degrees 
warmer, produced a rapid diminution. The effects of the wind 
in diminishing the human heat are indeed striking, and are not 
in my opinion explained by the common suppositions. 
4. The loss of heat by a change of media, depends much 
on the rapidity of the change, for the plastic power of life in 
varying the process of animal heat, so as to accommodate it to 
the external changes, acts for a time with great celerity, though 
this celerity seems to diminish with the strength. 
