1 16 Remarks on Madeira, Climate of the Tropics, die. 



the 24th of April (the interval of our second stay) it was between 

 85° or S6° and 78°. I never observed it, under any circum- 

 stance, ro vary more than 4, 5, or 6 degrees within twenty-four 

 hours. The season, however, proved uncommonly dry. I was 

 told that it occasionally varies more than this within that time. 

 I understood from a surgeon resident some time here, that it is 

 in winter so low as 5 1 : I, on the other hand, learnt from an in- 

 telligent merchant*, many years here, who I know has been 

 particularly attentive in this respect, that it is seldom or never 

 lower than 64". By this gentleman I was likcM'ise informed that 

 the alteration of temperature at the changes of the seasons is so 

 gradual and imperceptible, that the feelings are scarcely ever sen- 

 sible of the change, except that at night, in winter, a blanket is 

 required with a sheet, the only bed covering used in summer. Again, 

 all unite in admitting that the temperature and weather in win- 

 ter are congenial to their feelings; a circumstance that indicates 

 the former not to be lower than 60°, or at the very lowest 55°. 

 The rainy seasons generally take place, as in most other coun- 

 tries, in spring and autumn, and from time to time in summer; — 

 the last, as I before remarked, having proved a complete exception. 



Yet, after all, were it not for the salutary influence of the sea- 

 breeze daily, its vicissitudes with the land-breeze, the alternate 

 flowing and ebbing of the tides, and the nature of the soil (which 

 is sufficiently JnTplied in part of the foregoing description), the 

 city of Su Sebastian would certainly be a most unhealthy as well 

 as disagreeable place to live in. 



Ip. this citv are neither rivers nor streams of any kind. The 

 water destined for the supply of it seems on the whole insufficient 

 for this purpose ; — springing out of Cocanada, (one of those lofty 

 hills already described as situate to the left of Rio de Janeiro,) 

 it is finally' conducted thither through an aqueduct about four 

 miles in length, from which it discharges itself through three or- 

 dinary fountains; where the poor unfortunate negroes, doomed as 

 they are to perpetual and rigid servitude, anxiously wait night 

 and day to be barely supplied in rotation, especially in dry parch- 

 ing weather, when the body of this current, small even in the 

 wettest season, becomes still considerably diminished. 



In consequence of the want of sewers, the excrementitious and 

 other matter (necessarily produced by such an immense popula- 

 tion as St. Sebastian notoriously contains) is, with the exception 

 of about 150 yards from both sides of what is termed the Palace, 

 thrown openly near the water's side along the whole extent of 

 the town, and principally in those parts corresponding to the two 

 market-))laces in it. Hence, and from the influence of the very 



* Mr. W. Pearson, the copartner of Messrs. Seaton and Plowes, of a first- 

 rate firm in Rio de Janeii'o. 



high 



