226 METEOROLOGY. 



of the United states, and the northern of Venezuela^ we must not try- 

 to do it on that low and extremely narrow strip of land, which, bor- 

 dering the sea, stretches along the foot of the mountain chain running 

 east and west, parallel with the seashore. This low and narrow strip 

 of land has a climate of its own widely different from that of the Uni- 

 ted States. But when we take our abode on or near the top of the 

 mountain ridge where we are above the steady eastern trade winds, , 

 and find ourselves in quite a different set of atmospheric currents, and I 

 if we then pay particular attention to the more violent northerly ■ 

 winds, which now and then blow in this region, and to the great ; 

 southerly current, which lowers gradually in its course, reaches the : 

 surface of the sea somewhere between latitude 16"^ and 26° north, and 

 generally blows steady during a great part of the summer and fall of 

 the year up the Mississippi valley, even beyond latitude 39° north ;* 

 we then will recognize in the moisture-laden southeastern, as well as 

 in the dry and chilling northwestern, by their very peculiarities, their 

 namesakes of the United States. 



It is but five or six times a year that I am fortunate enough to get 

 hold of a few newspapers in these mountain solitudes, and it is seldom 

 that they contain anything regarding the weather of the United 

 States. However, I have read, only a few days ago, in a New York 

 paper of August 22, 1857, the following: 



"A private letter from New Orleans states that up to the 18th 

 instant, it had rained there every day for thirty-eight days consecu- 

 tively, and was still raining." 



Now, by referring to my register of meteorology I find a singular 

 coincidence between the occurrence of rain at New Orleans and Colonia 

 Tovar. The inclosed table No. 2 exhibits this more strikingly, for 

 we see here at once, that of all the seven months there is no other 

 equally long period that can compare with the period (rom July 18, 

 to August 20, with regard to the number of rainy hours. 



The following sentence from the Weekly Herald of September 5, 



1857: 



" From New Mexico. The season has been unusually dry and cold, 

 and the crops look very badly. So little rain has fallen that the little 

 stream near Santa Fe is dried up," shows that the rain-spending 

 southeast current of the atmosphere, which soaked in the month of 

 August the soils of Colonia Tovar and New Orleans, never was felt at 

 Santa Fe, New Mexico ; and that there is a closer correspondence 

 between the aereal strata of the coast of Venezuela and the lower ones 

 of Louisiana, than between those of Louisiana and those of Santa Fe, 

 although the distance in a straight line between the two former places 

 is more than double the distance between New Orleans and Santa Fe. 



Again, we find in the Weekly Herald of January 17, 1857 : 



" A terrific hurricane swept over the city and harbor of Vera Cruz 

 on the 20th of December," and " a heavy northerly gale had prevailed 

 for several days previous to the 25th of December (at Havana.") 



My meteorologicul register of Colonia Tovar shows, on the 17th of 



* While living at St. Louis, Missouri, I had a good opportunity to notice, during several 

 years, in July, August, and September, a steady southerly breeze almost day after day. In 

 some years, however, this wind blows less regular than in other years. 



