OF TREES. 
m 
when the fun by its mild rays at the beginning 
pf fpring refrelhes the earth, the fnpws melt, 
the 
lias fcarcely been known in this age, for the botanic ther- 
mometer funk to 32 degrees. Barck. 
In that thermometer the freezing point is o, and that of 
boiling water 100. So that taking it for granted that the 
author mull mean 32 below o, this point would anfwer to 57 
below 32 or the freezing point of Farenheit, which is a de- 
gree of cold never known in this countrey. I am allured 
from good authority, that in the year 1739 the thermome- 
ter did not link nine degrees below freezing point in England. 
They who are curious to fee much more furprizing inftances 
of cold than that in Sweden, may confult the preface to 
Gmelin’s Flora Sibirica, where they will find how very apt 
philofophers are to fall into miftakes about the powers of 
nature, when they trull; to theory, inftead of confulting 
experience. Monf. Maupertuis fays, that the mercury in 
Reaumur’s thermometer in Lapland funk to 37 degrees below 
freezing point, which is equal to 67 degrees in Farenheit. 
Perhaps, fays Linnaeus in the Flora Lapponica, the 
curious reader will wonder how the people in Lapland 
during the terrible cold, that reigns there in winter, can 
preferve their lives ; fince aim oft all birds, and even 
fome wild beafts, defer t it at that time. The Laplander 
not only in the day, but thro’ whole winter nights is 
obliged to wander about in the woods with his herds of 
rhen deer. For the rhen deer never come undercover, nor 
eat any kind of fodder, but a particular kind of li'vtr'wort. 
Gn this account the herdfmen are under a neceflity of liv- 
ing continually in the woods,, in order to take care of their 
cattle, left they fhould be devoured by wild beafts. The 
Lap- 
