November is not at all a vintage month; it is a blend, a period during which the pleasant aftertaste of summer can be detected in brief intervals of hazy sunshine. The roughness of the coming winter, however, intrudes with increasing arrogance as the month matures and the exuberant vivacity of the autumn foliage is often overwhelmed by the dark, dank, clammy fogs of the closing year.
Many years ago, the Dublin physician and amateur meteorologist John Rutty was of the view that there was a purpose to this elementary cocktail.
In 1772, he wrote of November: "It has more fogs and a good deal more storms and frosts than October - and for a very obvious reason, viz. that whilst the Sea and Earth are ever teeming with vapours, the ever-declining Sun hath not the power to dissipate them, and did not those storms proper to this month by the gracious and wise disposition of Providence, perform this work, undoubtedly the ill effects of the stagnating vapours would be felt much more than in fact they are."
Be that as it may, the records confirm November as a dull insipid month with very little sparkle. About two hours of sunshine is the norm - quite different from the normal six or seven hours which grace the average day in June - and, as you might expect, the month is always more than slightly chilled.
The highest temperature on an average November day is a mere 10 or 11 Celsius, while at the other extreme, the temperature in inland areas drops below zero on six or eight days during the month; the ground temperature is below zero on more than a third of November mornings.
Snow, it must be said, is unusual in November, but not unknown: parts of Ulster experience a light fall of snow, on average, on about three days of the month, and further south a little comes along about once every 10 years.
Gales, on the other hand, occur on three or four days of the month along our western and southern coasts, and in the extreme north they are experienced, on average, on as many as eight of November's 30 days.
The dark nights and November's wind and rain are an unwelcome foretaste of unpleasant things to come. Indeed Thomas Hood's description of it, penned a century and a half ago, says all that needs be said:
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease;
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees;
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds; November.