12 Meteorological Observations made in 
lowlands of the coast and interior. The mixed race, or people of © 
color, unite to bodily hardihood intrepidity, ambition, and a dead- 
ly feeling of those prejudices which, in spite of laws, continue to — 
separate them from the white descendants of the Spaniards, who - 
thus encounter, both in the high and lowland, two races in whom 
the seeds of hostility have been sown by injustice, and fostered 
by mistaken feelings of iuterest and vanity.* It is on the moun- 
tain slopes of from 3,000 to 7,000 feet that we encounter climates 
most analagous to our ideas both of health and pleasure. Raised 
above the noxious miasmata of the coast, we dwell in perpetual 
summer amid the richest vegetable productions of nature, amid 4 
continued succession of fruits and flowers. This picture, how- 
ever, must not be considered as universally exact. In those Un- 
broken forests where pdpulation has made little progress, the sky 
is often clouded, and the soil deluged with continual rains. 
western declivities of the Andes, which front the Pacific, are par; 
ticularly exposed to this inconvenience. 
It might be expected that with regard to human life and vigor; 
the elevated plains of the Andes would correspond to the northern 
countries of Europe. This, however, as far‘as regards the inhab- 
itants of the European race, does not seem exactly to take place 
It is true they escape the billious and intermittent fevers so prev 
alent in the lowlands ; but they are generally subject to typhus, 
dropsy, goitre, and such complaints as indicate constitutional de- 
bility. Nordo we find among them either the muscular strength 
or longevity of the Indians or Africans ; and still less of the nations 
of northern Europe. Are the diurnal changes of temperature [0 
which they are exposed, less favorable to health than the alterna 
tion of European seasons which expose the frame to change 
equally great but less rapid? Or must we rather look for thé 
cause in their domestic habits, which exhibit a strange mixture of 
effeminacy and discomfort ? - 
When we examine the social or political effects of climate 
and localities, we are struck with their powerful effects on the 
past struggles and present state of the country. The cities of the 
coast must be considered as the inlets both of European products 
and European ideas. Liberal opinions have extended themselves 
Sl oe : 
7 ite the people of color, or mixture of Africans with Whites and Indians, who 
on the plains form the most hardy and warlike part of the population of Colo 
