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THE winter of 1786-87 set in very early. At Warren, in Maine, on the fourteenth of November the St. George's river was frozen so hard and thick that the ice bore horses and sleighs as far down as Watson's Point, and on the following day to the mouth of the stream. It did not break up until the latter part of the following March. The sloop Warren, lying at the wharf in Thomaston and loading with a cargo for the West Indies, was frozen in and compelled to remain there all through the winter. By the twentieth of November, the harbor of Salem, Mass., was frozen over as far out as Naugus Head; and the Connecticut river was congealed so quickly that, at Middletown in that state, within twenty-four hours after boats passed over it the ice had become strong enough to bear heavy weights and people were driving on it with their horses and sleighs. Frozen into the river were between thirty and forty vessels that had been prepared for their voyages, the masters expecting to sail before the river was closed by ice. The month of December was unusually severe, and snow storms came frequently and terrifically, great quantities of snow covering the earth to a depth that impeded travel in all portions of the country. The remainder of the winter was also severe, and in the vicinity of Rockland, Me., snow remained on the ground as late as April 10, so deep and hard-crusted that teams passed over the fences in every direction without obstruction.

ABOUT five o'clock in the afternoon of Wednesday, August 23, 1786, the people of Sturbridge and Southbridge, Mass., and Woodstock, Pomfret and Killingly, Conn., saw rising in the Northwestern sky a dark cloud, which whirled around and around, and with unusual velocity moved up to the zenith. It spread over all the sky that was visible to the people of that neighborhood in a few moments and darkness, surpassing that of the dark day of 1780, settled over them. The people had not long to ponder on what was about to take place, as in a moment or two a whirlwind or hurricane struck across the towns named, and the wind had wrought its work and sped on and up. The sky quickly grew light again, and the clouds passed away to the eastward. So suddenly and so expeditiously was the entire destruction wrought, and the sky so quickly cleared again, it would have seemed like a dream but for the killed and wounded people and cattle, the levelled houses and barns and other evidences of the awful hurricane lying all about. Pen cannot describe the dreadful havoc and injury that can be accomplished in a moment's time by one of these unwelcome visitors, and this instance of the wind's power is accounted one of the most destructive in our history.