The meteorological phenomena were particularly remarkable prior to the breaking out of the influenza. The population were inadequately supplied with potatoes, from scarcity caused by the disease which had existed the previous years,--a sort of blight. Scurvy became prevalent at the beginning of the year. In April, typhus became epidemic, and the mortality was increased. Diarrhea, dysentery, and cholera also prevailed. The wind blew, from the first week in October, S. S. W. and S. W. The weather was universally warm; a brilliant aurora was observed, and shook the magnets, October 24th. It appeared eight times during the quarter. On Tuesday, November 16th, there was a remarkable darkness; the wind changed to N. W., and amidst various changes still blew from the north over Greenwich at the rate of 160 and 250 miles a day. The mean temperature of the air suddenly fell from 11° above to 10° below the average. On Sunday, it was 54°; Friday, 32°; on Friday night, 27°. The earth was frozen; the wind was calm three days, and on Saturday evening a dense fog lay over the Thames and London for the space of five hours. No electricity stirred in the air during the week,--all was still, as if Nature held her breath at the sight of the destroyer come forth to sacrifice her children. On Monday, the sky became overcast, the air damp; the wind changed in the night to S. by E., and passed for four days over Greenwich at the rate of 200 and 300 miles a day. The temperature suddenly rose, and remained from 2° to 9° above the average throughout the week ending on the 27th of November. Influenza broke out: in the first week in December, 2454 persons died; the week following, 2416 persons, and in six weeks, 11,339. The epidemic in that time carried off 5000 over and above the mortality of the season. The country districts do not appear to have been affected to any extent,--a fact which shows how much purity of the air has to do with the outbreak of epidemic diseases. Influenza, it has been observed, is often associated with other epidemics: it preceded and accompanied the plague or ‘black death’ in the fourteenth century; it preceded the great plague in London, A.D. 1665; it followed epidemic typhus A.D. 1803; preceded typhus A.D. 1837, and occurred in the midst of the typhoid epidemic in the year 1847. Influenza also preceded and followed epidemic cholera, 1831 to 1833. In short, it may be said that influenza has from time immemorial pretty generally preceded and accompanied epidemic pestilence in every quarter of the globe, as is noted by the Registrar-General to have been the case in England, A.D. 1728, 1733, 1743, 1758, 1762; five years after, A.D. 1767, 1775, 1782; again, A.D. 1788, A.D. 1803, 1831, 1832, and following year, 1833, as also A.D. 1846 and 1847. CHAPTER IX. NATURE AND CAUSES OF EPIDEMIC PESTILENCES.