10J2 Baron Von Buch''s Observations 



Were we to form a curve from tliese data, it is at once evi- 

 dent, that all the warmth, from the end of August to the end of 

 November, will seem not to belong to it, but to flow from quite 

 a distinct source. The opinion of the inhabitants fully coincides 

 with the indications of the instruments, that the heat in the mid- 

 dle of summer is not to be compared with that towards the mid- 

 dle and the end of October. The products of nature also con- 

 firm these results. Las Palmas has not been improperly named 

 from the palm tree ; for there is, at this day, a wood of date 

 palms, extending along the valley, whose fruit ripens well; which, 

 however, is not the case with the few scattered trees at Santa 

 Cruz, or at Oratava, in TenerifFe. The Euphorbia balsamifera, 

 which requires much heat, and which, at Oratava and Santa 

 Cruz, scarcely appears above ground, is found in this neigh- 

 bourhood, on heights of 800 feet ; and it is in no way unusual 

 to see bushes of it from ten to twelve feet high. The Placoma 

 pendula, very rai'e near Santa Cruz, grows equally large. A 

 multitude of East and West India trees also adorn the gardens 

 of Canary, which are not seen in Tenerifffe : Poinciana pulcher- 

 rima, of extraordinary beauty and size ; Bixa orellana ; Tama- 

 rind trees, as large as our limes, and a noble alley of large trees 

 of the Carica papaya, surrounds the inner court of the Hospital 

 of St Lazarus, which obviously succeed here better than the few 

 found scattered on the north coast of Teneriffe. Wherefore this 

 singular circumstance is well deserving the attention of those 

 who inquire into the laws for the distribution of temperature at 

 the earth's surface, and the other meteorological phenomena 

 therewith connected. 



Such irregularities and traces of local variation are not met 

 with in the curve of Santa Cruz. Hence, I think, it may safe- 

 ly be employed in the investigation of the decrease of heat in the 

 various latitudes which lie in equal longitudes of temperature. 

 I have, therefore, attempted to place several well ascertained 

 curves over each other, which seem to admit of being referred 

 to similar, or slightly modified laws, and inserted the observa- 

 tions themselves in the accompanying table. It contains the 

 temperatures of Cumana, Santa Cruz, Funchal, Kendal, in the 

 north-west of England ; Sondmor, near Drontheim, in Norway ; 

 and, lastly, several months, accurately ascertained from twelve 



