IX. 
MISCELLANEOUS NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS. 
Bead at Watford, 18 th March and 22nd April, 1890. 
Meteorology. 
Temperature and Rainfall at Hitchin , 1850-89.—In an early 
volume of our ‘ Transactions’ * there appeared tables by Mr. William 
Lucas giving the temperature and rainfall of thirty summers and 
thirty winters at Hitchin, the period being from 1850 to 1879. 
Having now been favoured by Mr. Lucas with a table giving, 
from his own observations for the forty years 1850-89, the mean 
temperature of each month and the maximum and minimum 
temperature and rainfall of each year, I thought that although the 
table could not conveniently be reproduced in its entirety in our 
1 Transactions,’ a summary of it might be of interest. Mr. Lucas 
does not give in his table either the mean monthly or mean annual 
temperature, or the mean rainfall, for the period. These means I 
have therefore computed; and with the view of endeavouring to 
ascertain whether there has been any secular change in the temper¬ 
ature or rainfall, I have also computed the means for each of the 
four decades. In the following table these means are given so 
far as relates to the temperature, and I have added the mean 
temperature of the coldest and the warmest month, and also of 
the coldest and the warmest year, during the whole period, with 
the date. 
Mean Temperature at JIit chin, 1850-89. 
Months 
1850-59 
1860-69 
1870-79 
1880-89 
1850-89 
Coldest 
Month 
and Year. 
Warmest 
Month 
and Year. 
January . 
O 
36-3 
O 
36-0 
O 
36*1 
O 
34‘9 
O 
35*8 
0 
28*1 
1881 
O 
41 # o 
1866 
February 
3b-4 
387 
37*2 
37-0 
37*3 
27-0 
1855 
42-5 
1867 
March. 
39*5 
39*5 
39*6 
38-4 
39*2 
30*8 
1886 
44*0 
1859 
April . 
44‘5 
46 9 
45'o 
44’2 
45*2 
4i*l 
1879 
50*7 
1869 
May . 
5°'° 
52-4 
49*i 
51-0 
50*6 
45*9 
1877 
56 0 
1889 
June . 
58*5 
57-6 
57-o 
57 ’ 2 
57*6 
54*5 
i 860 
62-5 
1858 
July . 
6 l '0 
6 o’i 
60 ’2 
607 
60-5 
55*9 
1875 
65*3 
1859 
August . 
60-3 
59*3 
59*2 
59*3 
59*5 
55*i 
1885 
62 7 
1857 
September 
55-2 
55*5 
53-5 
54*6 
54*7 
49*i 
1877 
60-5 
1865 
October . 
487 
487 
467 
45*9 
47*5 
42 ‘O 
1881 
52*3 
1886 
N ovember 
40*1 
40*0 
38-8 
4i*3 
40-0 
35*o 
1851 
463 
1888 
December 
37*8 
38-3 
34‘4 
36-8 
36*8 
29-2 
1874 
44*i 
1868 
Year . 
47’4 
47*8 
46-4 
46-8 
47*i 
43*7 
1879 
49*5 
1868 
It will be seen that the mean temperature of the whole forty 
years is 47°'1, of the first twenty, 47 0, 6, and of the last twenty, 
* ‘ Trans. Watford Nat. Hist. Soc.,’ Vol. II, p. 251. 
