These observations include those days on which slight showers fell. It is hardly necessary to remark, that our showers of summer rarely come so slow and drizzling as the short rains in England. If we add up the parts of days on which it rained or snowed in the vicinity of Boston, including, of course, those days on which it rained or snowed all day, we find an average of but 58.8 days, the largest number in any year of the series of nineteen being 72 days, the smallest 45 days, and these days are distributed among the several months as follows:

Or, to carry the comparison still farther, I take observations made in Berkshire County in 1837 and 1838, regarding them as average years, and find that the number of days on which it rained or snowed in these two years was 981; or, leaving out the days on which it snowed, we find that in 1837 it rained 381 days, and in 1838, 32. In 1837 there were 157 fair and 157 cloudy days; in 1838, 203 fair and 114 cloudy days. These, it should be noticed, were not excessively dry in that part of the State, but on the contrary, with the exception of great failures in wheat sown in competition for the State bounty, they were marked by agricultural prosperity. The amount of rain at Amherst, in the summer of those years, was,

These statistics show in the most striking light the characteristic difference in the climate of the two countries. The dry extreme, which never approaches the dry extreme of our climate, occurs in England but once in five years; the wet extreme once in ten years.

But we must not assume that more rain falls in England than in Massachusetts. The mean annual fall of rain near London for the period of 35 years, from 1797 to 1831, was 25.42 inches; while the mean annual amount for 12 years at Cambridge, Massachusetts, was 43.06 inches; at Boston, for 30 years, it was 42.43 inches; and at Amherst, for 17 years, 42 inches. Thus it appears most conclusively that we have far more rain during the year than falls in the castern parts of England.

The mean temperature of England appears from observations made near London to be 48°.5 Fahr., the latitude being 51° 31'; while the mean temperature at Boston, latitude 420 21', is 480.9. The mean annual temperature of the summer months in England is 610.7; at Boston for the same months it is 690.1. Thus the mean temperature of the two countries appears to be about the same, though the summer months present a very marked difference. But our climate is subject to sudden and marked changes, while that of England is comparatively equable. We have many days in winter when the thermometer falls far below zero, and in summer we frequently have it above 80°, or even 90°, for several days in succession; while in England it very seldom rises above 80° in summer without being followed very soon by thunder and rain, and very rarely falls as low as zero in winter.

The difference in the amount of evaporation of the two countries is a fair index of the difference in the climate of these countries. Evaporation will generally be found to be in proportion to the height of the temperature and the extent of water or land surface. Ordinarily, in temperate zones, it is about 37 inches a year, but in the tropics it amounts to from 90 to 100 inches. The atmosphere when at the freezing point contains about a two-hundredth part of its weight of water, while at 52° it contains about a one-hundreth part, at 74° a fiftieth part, at 98° a twenty-fifth part; and so on. The evapo

ration in our climate is of course vastly greater than in England, and simply because our summer heats are greater. And as the effects of evaporation upon the soil, and upon vegetable and animal growth, can evidently, in a great measure, be controlled by various operations on the farm, it follows that a system of agriculture which might be best adapted to one climate might be very ill suited to a climate where the atmospheric phenomena were so different.

This difference of climate becomes a matter of great practical importance when we take into view the influence which it must have on the animals which we import from England. Although there is no very great difference in the average annual temperature of the two countries, we have seen that the changes are far greater and more sudden with us; and both our summer heats and our extremely cold weather in winter are vastly more severe than any that is ever known in the south of England or in the Isle of Jersey. Moreover, our climate is very stimulating, and a constant strong stimulus, applied to an animal not accustomed to it, must greatly accelerate the action of the heart, and thus affect the whole system. The change acts so powerfully on the human system that the circulation is quickened to the extent of fifteen pulsations a minute over the usual number before being subject to this stimulus. Its effect must be as much more powerful and perceptible on the larger animals, as their arteries are larger than ours. A similar effect on cattle is familiar to drovers in some parts of our own country, and particularly to those who drive from Ohio, or from Kentucky, the climate of which is not very unlike that of England, to the New Orleans market. The loss from this cause became so serious as to excite the attention of physicians, and a paper was prepared by a distinguished scientific man, in which, after stating that a gradual and steady reduction of the animal energy should be produced, he says, "The quantity of food which the system will in ordinary circumstances require must be diminished, and all the common exciting causes of increased arterial action, such as the heat of the sun, quick motion of any kind, be avoided. Besides, those medicines, which have a tendency to diminish the heart's action, must not only on the first attack of the fever be resorted to,

but should, we think, even in a state of health, from time to time be administered. Shade, a plentiful supply of water for the animal to stand in during the heat of the day, I conceive to be of all things the most essential."

It is well known that much disappointment has been experienced in importing Arabian horses into England, where they not unfrequently become wholly unfruitful, or give birth to a progeny far inferior to themselves. It is by no means improbable that a like effect will be produced on the sheep which have been carried from the north to the south of our own country within the last few years.

Animals should gradually be accustomed to a new climate, otherwise deterioration must inevitably follow. This was observed even by the earliest settlers of New England, and the cows raised from those first imported were very soon found to be smaller than their dams. If we consider for a moment the distinguishing characteristics of animals which have been accustomed to a warm climate, and compare them with those of the same variety after they have been long exposed to a colder one, we shall see still more clearly the importance of care and caution where the change is great. Animals bred in a warm climate will answer in the main to the following description: “Their skin is thin, supple and oily; their hair scanty and fine; their limbs long, the tendinous parts distinct; their horns hard, dry and brittle; the hoof contracted; the feet narrow and sound; the muscles dry, and but slightly fat; and their temperament rather sanguineous than lymphatic. The circulation of the blood becomes accelerated; they possess much ardor, energy and courage; while the several parts of their bodies seldom acquire very voluminous proportions." If we look, now, at the characteristics of the animals of a colder region, we find that they have "more strongly marked proportions; have their skin thicker, harder and drier; their hair longer, coarser, and more bushy; their extremities shorter, with the tendons less strongly pronounced; the horns softer and more spongy; the feet larger, broader, more flattened, and less compact; the muscles stronger, closer, and well supplied with fat. Their temperament is rather lymphatic than sanguineous, their circulation is slower, they possess less physical and mental energy, and may

almost be said to consist wholly of matter, as they are visibly deficient in ardor, energy and courage."

The descriptions given above apply respectively to animals which live in very warm or very cold countries. Those brought from England, France, or the Isle of Jersey, to New England, do not find a climate entirely the reverse of their own, but there is difference enough to make the change in some degree injurious to them. Undoubtedly much may be done to facilitate acclimation, and prevent ill effects from the change, by care in providing suitable shelter in winter. It would be still better to import them while young, when, from the greater flexibility of organization at that age, they would more easily accommodate themselves to their new circumstances. Yet, with all the precaution and care which can be taken, it must still be somewhat doubtful whether the delicate organizations of the thoroughbred animals will be able to bear the extremes of the climate of New England without injury.

There is another point of view in which this difference of climate is worthy of consideration. I refer to the practice of draining, and the great importance now laid upon it by most theoretical writers on agriculture, guided very much in their deductions by the results of this practice in England. It will have been noticed by what has been said that more water falls here than in England; but it does not follow that our lands are wetter, for we have seen that, while England has an atmosphere eminently foggy, we have one eminently dry, or, at least, liable every year to cause the crops to suffer during the growing season for want of moisture. Evaporation here is very rapid, while there it is comparatively slow; and of course after a rain the soil is much longer in drying, and consequently a small amount of rain there may cause the soil to be wet and cold. No one can doubt the propriety as well as the profit of draining all wet and cold soils which it is designed to improve, and particularly all lands where there is an excess of water on the surface, all stiff, clayey soils, and loams in which clay predominates, and generally all springy soils. Draining and loosening the soil allows the air to penetrate into it, and to cause those chemical changes to take place which are necessary to prepare the nourishment of the plant and to promote