Carlyle, the eloquent editor of "Cromwell's Letters
and Speeches" (8vo. 1846), that the great tempest which Clarendon
asserts to have raged "for some hours before and after the
Protector's death", really occurred four days previous to that event.
Aubrey no doubt readily adopted the general belief upon the subject.
He quotes, without expressly dissenting from it, the opinion of Chief
Justice Hale, that "whirlewinds and all winds of an extraordinary
nature are agitated by the spirits of air". Lunar rainbows, and
meteors of various kinds, are described in this chapter; together with
prognostics of the seasons from the habits of animals, and some
observations made with the barometer; and under the head of Echoes,
"for want of good ones in this county", there is a long description
by Sir Robert Moray of a remarkable natural echo at Roseneath, about
seventeen miles from Glasgow. On sounds and echoes there are some
curious notes by Evelyn, but these are irrelevant to the subject of
the work.- J. B.]
BEFORE I enter upon the discourse of the AIR of this countie, it would
not be amiss that I gave an account of the winds that most commonly
blow in the western parts of England.
I shall first allege the testimony of Julius C?sar, who delivers to
us thus: "Corns ventus, qui magnam partem omnis temporis in his locis
flare consuevit". - (Commentaries, lib. v.) To which I will subjoine
this of Mr. Th. Ax, of Somersetshire, who hath made dayly observations
of the weather for these twenty-five years past, since 1661, and finds
that, one yeare with another, the westerly winds, which doe come from
the Atlantick sea, doe blowe ten moneths of the twelve.
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