LOWEST TEMPERATURE OF JANUARY, 1838. 
241 
contracted, and 6f inches when extended; and that of a Cormorant, in the 
former case 9f inches, and in the latter 15i inches. But as, in these cases, the 
bones of the upper larynx and lower larynx, which do not slip over each other, 
are included, a better idea of the extensibility of the trachea is obtained from a 
fragment of it taken from the middle. Thus, a portion of the trachea of a Book, 
1 inch long when contracted as much as it can be, measures 2| inches when 
extended to the utmost; and a portion of that of a Wood Pigeon 1 inch long 
when contracted, may be extended to 2f inches. But the greatest range known 
to me is exhibited by the dilated portion of the trachea of the Golden-eyed 
Duck, which may be contracted to a quarter of an inch, and extended to two 
inches and a quarter. This, however, is effected by a mechanism different from 
that usually exhibited; for although the rings cross each other in front, in the 
ordinary manner, they are narrower behind, and gradually fall within each 
other upwards. 
Edinburgh , March 12 , 1838. 
THE LOWEST TEMPERATURE OF JANUARY, 1838. 
By Hewett Cottrell Watson, Esq., F.L.S. 
Editor of the Phrenological Journal. 
According to the Meteorological Journal of the Royal Society, regularly 
published in The Athenaeum , the minimum of the thermometer in January last 
was on the 16th, when the mercury fell very slightly below 11^ degrees, the 
point to which it sunk on the 20th. Upon the faith of the Royal Society’s 
Journal, the Monthly Chronicle , for March, has called in question the accuracy 
of the register at the Horticultural Gardens, Turnham Green, where the thermo¬ 
meter is said to have fallen 4 degrees below zero on the night following the 
19th. Struck by the rapid sinking of the temperature, in the early part of that 
evening, I paid particular attention to my thermometers, and can bear testimony 
to the accuracy of the observations at the Horticultural Gardens, so far as a still 
lower temperature at a few miles distance can do this. At six o’clock on the 
evening of the 19th, a thermometer (made by Dollond), in a glass cylinder, 
fifteen feet above the ground, stood at 12 degrees. By eight o’clock the mercury 
had disappeared from the tube, which is graduated down to three degrees above 
zero. A short space intervening between the lowest line marked and the bulb, 
the mercury must have been at least down to zero at this time. I immediately 
suspended a common ivory thermometer (made by Adie) on a nail in the out- 
