206 Mr. R. Swinhoe on Formosan Ornithology. 



coast is undulating and mountainous j but on the east, from 

 lat 25° as far as Sawo Harbour, you have a large plain, with a 

 few small rivers. South of Sawo the coast is very lofty and 

 precipitous, with occasionally a sandy valley opening out into 

 the sea. There are no harbours on this dangerous side, and 

 apparently no shore. Up this entire length of east coast we 

 have the Pacific warm or gulf-stream, called by the Japanese 

 the Kuro-siwo, which, passing the north-east corner of our 

 coast, takes a turn, and warming the northern shores of Japan, 

 spreads itself out to temper the Californian and the western 

 coast of America. To this ever north-flowing warm stream we 

 owe the six mouths^ almost incessant rain that prevails during the 

 winter at Formosa. Whenever the N.E. monsoon blows strong 

 (and that is too frequently the case in winter), the warm vapours 

 of this stream saturate the wind, and induce incessant precipita- 

 tion on our land and about twelve miles to seaward. The rain- 

 line does not extend much beyond this, and the monsoon passes to 

 the Chinese coast as a dry, cool, bracing breeze. The tempera- 

 ture in summer rarely rises above 100°, and in winter, on the 

 sea-level, seldom falls below 40°. In autumn, every afternoon, 

 masses of storm-clouds regularly every day roll northwards along 

 the mountain-chain, accompanied with loud roars of thunder, 

 fearful flashes of lightning, and great sultriness of atmosphere in 

 the plains, on which the clouds at that season do not often burst. 

 The coast of Formosa is too well known for its stormy character, 

 for every typhoon or gale that visits the Chinese coast gives us 

 first the benefit of its violence. During my short stay at the 

 capital, I experienced two severe typhoons and several heavy 

 gales. Between Tamsuy and Kelung are the great coal and 

 sulphur mines for which Formosa is justly celebrated, and on 

 several of our hills there are indications of extinct craters j but 

 there is no active volcano, to my knowledge, nearer than about 

 the latitude of the capital. This we once witnessed smoking 

 as we lay at anchor ofi" the coast. Notwithstanding its great 

 heat, Formosa does not bear an entirely tropical character. We 

 have no cocoa-nuts and no parrots. This was remarked by an 

 old Dutch traveller more than a century ago, and it still holds 

 good. But we have areca-palms, rattan-canes, sugar-cane, tea. 



