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L CLIMATOLOGY OF THE UNITED STATES

The Climate of the United States and its Endemic Influen

ces, &c. By Samuel Forry, M.D.

II. THE FUNERAL OF GOETHE.-From the German of Harro

Harring. By Alexander H. Everett.

III. AMERICAN NAMES

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IV. BROOK FARM.-By O. A. Brownson.

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449

471

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481

V. THE FORSAKEN.-By the Author of "Tecumseh."

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VI. POLITICAL PORTRAITS WITH PEN AND PENCIL.-No. XXXIII.

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(With a fine Engraving on Steel.)

VII. HARRY BLAKE. A STORY OF CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE,

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Rambles in Yucatan; or Notes of Travel through the Pe-
ninsula, including a Visit to the Ruins of Chi-Chen, Ka-
bah, Zayi, and Urmal. By a Modern Antiquary.

X. PASSAGES FROM A POLITICIAN'S NOTE-BOOK.

1. The Palace of the President.

2. The Coup-de-Grace.

3. The Next Session of Congress.

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XII. MONTHLY FINANCIAL AND COMMERCIAL ARTICLE
XIII. SONNET.

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XI. A DAY DREAM.

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ON THE DEATH OF CHANNING.-By Cornelius Ma

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THIS NUMBER CONTAINS SEVEN SHEETS, ONE HUNDRED AND TWELVE PAGES.

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THE excellent work to which reference is made at the foot of this page has one merit which is of primary importance-it is as valuable for the authenticity as for the originality of its materials. In its preparation, its laborious and judicious author has accumulated a mass of facts for which alone he is eminently entitled to the thanks, not only of the scientific world, but in a peculiar degree, of his countrymen at large-data which have required years to collect, and years to collate and digest. Unlike all other treatises on the same subject, which are generally loosely written and made up of the most vague and general statements, the deductions of this volume are based upon precise instrumental observations. "The design of this work," in Dr. Forry's own language, "is to exhibit a connected view of the leading phenomena of our climate, both physical and medical, comprising a condensation of all the author's observations on the subject." It is based chiefly on the "Army Meteorological Register," and the "Statistical Report on the Sickness and Mortality in the Army of the United States," embracing a period of twenty years (1819 to 1839), both of which are the result of the labors of the same author, who

No. LIII.

has now derived from them their present useful and interesting application. Having presented in Part First a classification of the principal phenomena of our climate, physically considered, Dr. Forry traces out, in Part Second, the medical relations of these laws, thus establishing in both a classification of climates, having for its basis observation; and having extended his researches through a long series of years, and over vast masses of individuals, he has disclosed many important relations having reference to the health and disease of our wide-spread borders.

Climatology, although of the highest interest to man in every conceivable relation of his earthly existence, yet has been, strange to say, wonderfully neglected so far as regards the climate of our own country. Indeed, so little effort has been made to keep pace with the progress of kindred branches of science, that the work of M. Volney on the climate of the United States, written more than forty years ago, when this French savant made a flying visit through our country, is still quoted by every writer on this topic. So barren of precise data, in truth, is this work, that the author's only instrumental observations consist

• The Climate of the United States and its Endemic Influences: based chiefly on the Records of the Medical Department and Adjutant General's Office, United States Army. By Samuel Forry, M. D. New York: J. & H. G. Langley. 1842. 8vo. pp. 380.

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of a few thermometrical results obtained from a literary gentleman in New York, for which even he made no acknowledgment. Prior to the appearance of Dr. Forry's work, we possessed no treatise founded on facts in regard to the climate of the region that we inhabit. It is, therefore, with particular pleasure that we hail the volume before us, in which the author has determined the relations to one another of the isolated facts collected in reference to our climate, and in which, as regards the general laws of climate, he has demonstrated their harmony throughout the globe.

The merit of being the first to establish, on an extensive scale, a system of meteorological observations, with a view to the elucidation of the laws of climate throughout the United States, is due to the late Surgeon-General of the United States Army, Dr. Joseph Lovell, who in 1819 issued instructions to the medical officers of the different posts to keep regular records of the weather and to transmit them quarterly to the Medical Bureau at Washington. In 1820 and 1821, he published the general results of each year, and in 1826, the connected results of the observations for the preceding four years. The first State that followed in this laudable measure was New York, whose academies and other schools, established under legislative patronage, have been bound, for many years past, to keep meteorological registers, and make reports of the results to the regents. In 1836, a liberal appropriation for similar purposes was made by the Legislature of Pennsylvania, thus supplying each county in the State with a set of meteorological instruments; and the observations thus made have been reported monthly to a special committee of the Franklin Institute, where they are at all times open for consultation. As Ohio has come, within the last year, into a similar measure, we have now a very extensive district of country dotted, as it were, with points of instrumental meteorological observation. When to these efforts of individual States and those of the medical department of our army, we add the observations made under the direction of the British authorities in their extensive possessions, as well as those of private individuals throughout the continent of North

America, it is cheering to those engaged in solving the intricacies of meteorological phenomena to look forward to the prospects of the future.

In this general view of the existing state of climatology in our country, we must not forget the present head of the Medical Department of the United States Army, Dr. Thomas Lawson. To him the volume before us is appropriately dedicated, inasmuch as it was under his official direction that the investigation of the subject was first undertaken by Dr. Forry in the "Army Meteorological Register," and the "Statistical Report on the Sickness and Mortality of the Army of the United States."

"In the investigation of the laws of climate," observes Dr. Forry, "a range of subjects so multifarious as to comprise almost every branch of natural philosophy, is embraced; but its true province is properly restricted to a general view of these subjects, which, if based on legitimate deductions of observed phenomena, should enable us to reduce the infinite variety of appearances presented to us in nature, to a few general principles. It is by means of this generalization that the subject will be elevated to the dignity of a science.

"Climate embraces not only the temperature of the atmosphere, but all those modifications of it which produce a sensible effect on the physical and moral state of man, as well as on all other organic structures, such as its serenity, humidity, changes of electric tension, variations of barometric pressure, its tranquillity as respects both horizontal and vertical currents, and the admixture of terrestrial emanations dissolved in its moisture. Climate, in a word, constitutes the aggregate of all the external physical circumstances appertaining to each locality in its relation to organic nature."

Considering the vast importance of this subject to human welfare, it is lamentable to contemplate its meagerness in the advanced state of knowledge in the nineteenth century. Even at the present day, one writer regards climate as differing only with the distance of parallel zones from the equator or the poles; another, as dependent on the internal heat of the globe; a third, as merely a tabular arrangement of the course of winds, of the

quantity of rain, and of thermometric, hygrometric, and barometric degrees; whilst a fourth, supposing himself in advance of the age, refuses to admit that climate is materially modified by any causes other than latitude and local elevation.

The prosecution of this subject, as pointed out by Dr. Forry, promises to confer upon mankind benefits of the most interesting and valuable nature. The general law of the decrease of heat for each parallel, from the equator to the pole, subject as it is to modification from local causes, may be ascertained, as well as that for each vertical height in proportion to its elevation above the level of the sea. We may determine the bounds of each species of vegetation, and draw around the globe series of curves, that is, lines of equal annual temperature, or isothermal lines,-lines of equal summer temperature, or isotheral curves,—and lines of equal winter temperature, or isocheimal curves. It is pleasing to contemplate such a division of the earth, each of these belts representing a zone, in which we may trace the causes of the existing similarity or diversity in animal and vegetable productions. To determine the influence of these zones respectively upon the animal economy in health, and the agency exercised in the causation of disease, has afforded investigations still more useful and interesting. As climate not only affects the health, but modifies the whole physical organization of man, and consequently influences the progress of civilisation, a comparison of these systems of climate, as distinguished into constant and variable climes, or mild and extreme ones, in connection with the influence of the noxious exhalations which arise from the earth, will reveal to the medical philosopher much that is now unknown, and to the political economist many of the circumstances that control the destinies of a people. The complete development of the mental, moral, and physical attributes of man, even when nature has bestowed a perfect organization, is made to depend upon the physical agents which influence those functions. For full mental and corporeal development, the due succession of the seasons is requisite. Those countries which have a marked spring, summer, autumn,

and winter, are best adapted, by this agreeable and favorable vicissitude, for developing the most active powers of man. It is, according to Malte-Brun, between the 40th and 60th degrees of north latitude, that we find the nations most distinguished for knowledge and civilisation, and the display of courage by sea and by land. This limitation, however, is inapplicable to the United States, in consequence of a feature in our climate to be described hereafter. With us the 32d and the 46th parallels would form a reasonable boundary. In general, in countries which have no summer, the inhabitants are destitute of taste and genius; whilst in the regions unfavored by winter, true valor, loyalty, and patriotism, are almost unknown. As in the corporeal structure, different effects result from the dry and restless air of the mountain, compared with those evidenced in the moist and sluggish atmosphere of the valley, so, as regards the mental manifestations, the observation of the poet Gray is philosophically correct:

"An iron race the mountain cliffs maintain,

Foes to the gentler manners of the plain."

Our author has taken for his motto the remark of Malte-Brun, that "the best observations upon climate often lose half their value for the want of an exact description of the surface of the country;" and accordingly he has given a bold outline of the physical features of the vast region stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, and from the Gulf of Mexico to the inland seas on our northern border.

The Atlantic Plain, extending from the Hudson to the Mississippi, is described as slightly elevated above the sea, gradually widening from a few miles in the North to upwards of one hundred and fifty miles in the South. Among the physical features which characterize this alluvial zone, which slopes gently down to the ocean, are extensive morasses and swamps, sluggish streams, and wide arms of the sea penetrating far inland. It is composed, in a great measure, of tertiary and secondary cretaceous deposits, consisting of alternating beds of sand and clay, and sometimes marl, all abounding in marine fossil shells. As the al

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