250 CUBA AND PORTO RICO 



noon or evenings. During the rest of the year, which 

 coxcrs the dry season from October to April, the tempera- 

 ture is on an average about 10 lower. 



On the less sheltered coasts, even at sea-level, it is much 

 cooler: and as one ascends the mountains of the interior, 

 the intense heat of the seaboard becomes moderated. Six- 

 teen hundred feet above the sea, Americans and Europeans 

 complain of the cold at night, though even there the mer- 

 cury never falls below 45. 



At Port-au-Prince the rainy season covers the summer 

 months, but in the other parts of the republic the rains 

 run into and cover the winter months, so that there is 

 never a season when rain prevails everywhere. In general, 

 on the lower slopes of the Windward side and in the de- 

 pressed interior valleys, it is arid, rain sometimes being 

 almost constantly lacking ; but the mountains above two 

 thousand feet are perpetually bathed in rainfall, mists, or 

 dews. 



With the exception of wild hogs on the He de la 

 Tortue, some untamed horses and cattle in the eastern 

 part of Haiti, and wild goats, there are few animals on the 

 island. Even the agouti, that peculiar Antillean mammal, 

 is believed to be nearly extinct, and the selenodon (or coati) 

 is rarely found. There are no poisonous snakes. Land- 

 turtles, reptiles, and lizards abound, but they are harmless. 

 Of the forty species of birds recorded in Haiti, seventeen 

 are peculiar to it. The cayman abounds in all the rivers 

 of the Despoblado district, and the iguana sometimes 

 attains a length of five feet. 



