places. The frog, lizard, badger, and hedgehog, which burrow under the earth, belong to this class; as also the bat, which is found in caverns, barns, &c. suspended by the claws of its hind feet, and closely enveloped in the membranes of the fore feet. Dormice, squirrels, water-rats, and field-mice, provide a large stock of food for the winter season.

On every sunny day through the winter, clouds of insects, usually called gnats (tipulæ and empedes), appear sporting and dancing over the tops of evergreen trees in shrubberies; and they are seen playing up and down in the air, even when the ground is covered with snow. At night, and in frosty weather, or when it rains and blows, they appear to take shelter in the trees.

Little work is done by the farmer, out of doors, in this month; his cattle demand almost all his attention and assiduity.

The grave of the year is now prepared, and the dark and wintery wreath' is already strewn over it: another year, another delightful season which is again to awaken all nature, and diffuse warmth and life, and happiness around, is eagerly anticipated;-inspiring new hopes, and the most pleasing expecta

tions:

Another Spring! my heart exulting cries;

Another YEAR! with promised blessings rise!

ETERNAL POWER! from whom those blessings flow,
Teach me still more to wonder, more to know:
Seed-time and Harvest let me see again;
Wander the leaf-strewn wood, the frozen plain:
Let the first flower, corn-waving field, plant, tree,
Here round my home, still lift my soul to THEE;
And let me ever, midst thy bounties, raise
A humble note of thankfulness and praise.

BLOOMFIELD.

Meteorological Remarks.

METEOROLOGY, or that science which explains the phenomena of the weather, remained for a long period in a state of comparative neglect. This is sufficiently remarkable when we consider that almost all the operations necessary for the support of human life, and almost all the comforts of corporeal feeling, depend upon the state of the atmosphere. It was not till the seventeenth century that any progress was made in the investigation of the laws of meteorology, when the most important discoveries of the barometer and thermometer occurred ;--these, added to the invention of excellent hygrometers and electrometers, in the eighteenth century, have enabled the philosopher to make accurate and satisfactory observations, which have been collected from time to time, and many important practical results have been deduced therefrom.

The advantages arising from a foreknowledge of the changes of the weather, were duly appreciated by the antients; and, though ill-founded predictions, in later times, have somewhat impeached the credit of meteorological remarks, yet a very considerable degree of certainty in this respect may easily be attained by the diligent observer of nature. The experienced fisherman will rarely unfurl his sails when a storm is approaching; and, in like manner, if farmers were equally attentive, and had acquired equal judgment in this art, they would reap very material benefit, by profitably regulating the management and housing of their crops.

It does not fall within the scope of the present work to enter at large upon the interesting subject of Meteorology: there are already scientific treatises on this subject to which the student may resort. We shall therefore proceed, first, to offer some remarks on the artificial distinctions of clouds, accord

ing to the nomenclature of Mr. Luke Howard; and afterwards to give a few popular rules for predicting the changes in the weather, which are deduced from the various appearances of the atmosphere-from animals and vegetables-from philosophical instruments, &c.; together with the Shepherd of Banbury's twenty-five celebrated rules.

I.-ARTIFICIAL DISTINCTIONS OF CLOUDS.

Clouds are distinguished by seven modifications, the peculiarities of which seem to be caused by the agency of electricity: for example, three primary modifications, the Cirrus, the Cumulus, and the Stratus: two which may be considered as intermediate in their nature, the Cirrocumulus and Cirrostratus; one which appears to be a compound, the Cumulostratus; and, lastly, the Cumulocirrostratus, or Nimbus, a state which immediately precedes the resolution of clouds into rain.

1. Cirrus.-The cirrus is a cloud which appears to have the least density, and generally the most elevation, and which has the greatest variety of extent and direction. It may truly be called the Proteus of the skies; for, in some kinds of weather, its figure is so rapidly and so continually changed, that, after turning the eye away from it for a few minutes, it will frequently be found so completely altered as scarcely to be identified as the same cloud. This, however, is not always the case; it is sometimes visible for many hours and even days together, without much changing its appearance.

After a continuance of clear weather, the cirrus is frequently the first cloud which is seen. In this case it often looks like a fine whitish thread, pencilled, as Mr. Howard expresses it, on the clear blue sky: to this, other faint lines of the same kind are added laterally; they increase in size and length, and often serve as stems from which numerous branches proceed, and become other cirri of the same kind.

2. Cumulus. This is a convex aggregate of watery particles increasing upwards from a horizontal base. It is commonly of a dense structure, formed in the lower atmosphere, and moving along in the current of wind which is next to the earth. Its first appearance is generally a small irregular spot, which becomes the nucleus on which it forms. This increases in size, preserves a flat horizontal base, and assumes somewhat of a conical figure. Cumuli vary a little in shape and dimensions, according to pecu liarities in the operation of the causes which produce them. Sometimes they are pretty well defined hemispherical masses; at others, they rise into mountains, ranged in one plane, their silvery summits presenting a beautiful appearance.

3. Stratus,-The stratus is the lowest of clouds; its under surface usually rests on the earth or water. It may properly be called the cloud of night, as it frequently makes its appearance about sunset, and disappears soon after sunrise. When ascending in the atmosphere, it often seems to take the form of cumulus. It comprehends what we usually call fogs and mists, which in fine summer evenings are seen to ascend in spreading sheets from valleys, lakes, and fields. In autumn and winter it sometimes continues throughout the day. It must be remembered, however, that all fogs are not strati ; some appear to be of the modification of cirrostratus.

4. Cirrocumulus.-After the cirrus has ceased to conduct the electric fluid, it probably either disappears by dispersion or evaporation, or it changes into the cirrocumulus or cirrostratus. Its change to the cirrocumulus is frequently marked by the following circumstances: it loses its cirriform and fibrous structure, descends lower in the atmosphere, and assumes the form of a number of well defined and roundish little clouds, lying in close horizontal arrangement: the change is more or less rapid on different occasions, and sometimes takes place in part

of the cloud, while the other part remains cirriform, or approaches to the nature of cirrostratus. The cirrocumulus is frequent in summer, and often forms very beautiful skies: at all times of the year it may be seen, in the intervals of showers, and before an increase of temperature, of which its prevalence is a pretty certain prognostic. Extensive beds of cirrocumuli, floating gently along in different altitudes, must have attracted almost every body's notice; the beautiful appearance of these clouds, with a moonlight evening, has been aptly described by Bloomfield:

Far yet above these wafted clouds are seen,
In a remoter sky, still more serene,
Others detached in ranges through the air,
Spotless as snow, and countless as they 're fair;
Scattered immensely wide, from east to west,
The beauteous semblance of a flock at rest.

The Farmer's Boy ;—Winter.

5. Cirrostratus.-In speaking of the cirrus, it has been observed that that cloud frequently changed into some other. Its change is generally into either the cirrocumulus or cirrostratus: when it passes to the latter, it descends lower in the atmosphere, its fibres become denser and more regularly horizontal, and it generally appears subsiding, or altering its forms. The figure of the cirrostratus, like that of the cirrus, is very various: sometimes it consists in dense longitudinal streaks; at others it looks like shoals of fish: sometimes the whole sky is so mottled with it, as to give the idea of the back of the mackerel; and hence called the mackerel-back sky. It frequently appears like the grains of polished wood, or is composed of fine fibres, disposed after the manner of the fibres of muscles, which often intersect each other.

6. Cumulostratus.-The change of the cumulus into the cumulostratus is effected in the following manner: The cumulus, losing its hemispherical