Dr Siordet, an English medical practitioner who has been resident on the spot for several years, mentions in his small work, _Mentone in its Medical Aspect_ (1863), that the ‘small daily range of temperature is one of the most important features of Mentone.’ He instances the greatest for two years as being 15°·5 Fahr., and that in another year it was 23°; also stating that the range was least in the colder months. In the tables which he quotes, the mean temperature of the winter months for ten years was as follows: November, 54°; December, 49°; January, 48°·75; February, 49°; March, 52°·9. During my stay on both occasions I hung up a thermometer outside one of the windows, with a southern exposure, but shaded from the sun, and recorded its indications twice daily, at eight o’clock morning, and three o’clock afternoon, and these pretty much corresponded with Dr Siordet’s tables. Frequently, the temperature ranged from about 40° in the morning to 60° or 65° at from noon to three o’clock. In November and December the temperature in the morning was often 58°, and beyond this it did not rise if the day became overclouded. In our bedrooms without a fire, the temperature in the mornings, on rising, between seven and eight o’clock, ranged throughout the winter at from 50° to 60°—commonly at about 54°. With these generally favourable features in the climate, it has to be emphatically stated that there are great differences of weather in different winters. The season of 1868–69 was immensely superior to that of 1869–70, but so was it everywhere throughout Europe, also on the northern coast of Africa, and at Malta. Though well sheltered from the northern blasts, Mentone lies invitingly open to winds from the south, south-east, and south-west, and these can be cold enough when the Atlantic is encumbered with icebergs, or when other causes of atmospheric disturbance greatly lower the temperature of the European continent and African coast. While the vegetation of the district is a proof that the summers are hot, and the winters on the whole mild, it is indisputable that the mildness is sometimes broken in upon by days and weeks of cold weather, in which few visitors, with any regard to health, venture out. At the close of 1868 and beginning of 1869, the weather was beautiful; the _jour de l’an_ as fine as could be desired, and the thoroughfares crowded with holiday-makers. Let us contrast this state of things with the weather twelve months afterwards. I quote from my notebook.