170 Remarks on the Climate, Situation, and [Sept. 



which we received from time to time from our friends in England. 

 Since my return home I thought it might be an object of suffi- 

 cient utility, in some respects, to be worthy of a little time and 

 trouble, to put my observations into some kind of order, by 

 arranging those of the temperature taken at Nice and in 

 England * together on a common synoptical scale, by which a 

 comparison could be more readily made between the two 

 climates in respect of the changeableness and difference of 

 temperature. I regret much that I was not furnished with a 

 barometer, that I might have added observations with that 

 instrument also into my table. 



The latitude of Nice is about 43^. degrees north, or eight 

 degrees south of London, and 7^ degrees east of the same. 

 The city, with its suburbs, is situated in, or rather surrounded 

 by a rich plain, which may be about a mile and a half from east 

 to west, and about two miles from north to the sea shore ; it is 

 bounded by a range of hills, which, beginning to the south east 

 at the distance of about a quarter of a mile from the town, are 

 continued as far round as the south west of various forms and 

 gradations ; and, like the successive benches in an amphitheatre, 

 rise one above another until the snowy chain of the maritime 

 Alps, about 8,000 or 10,000 feet high, appears like the boundary 

 wall to the whole at a distance of about 25 or 30 miles. The 

 city is situated near the shore, which immediately faces the 

 south ; and the river Paglion, which takes its rise among the 

 neighbouring mountains, after flowing through the plain, enters 

 the sea near the city walls. The sea is remarkable for the beau- 

 tiful blue colour it generally exhibits, probably arising partly 

 from the absence of tides, by which its waters, being so little 

 disturbed, become highly transparent. After rain, however, the 

 limestone washings from the neighbouring mountains tinge its 

 waters to a considerable distance off the mouths of the rivers, 

 which sometimes has a curious appearance. The deep blue 

 colour of this sea may also be owing to its depth, which is very 

 considerable off this coast ; according to the measurement of 

 Saussure taken about half a league off the Cape, between the 

 ports of Nice and Villefranche, the depth was found to be 1,800 

 feet ; it might also be observed by the great length of line used 

 by the coral fishers who ply off this shore. Although little or no 

 tide is perceptible in this sea, a southerly wind, or the approach 

 of one, raises the ordinary level of the water some feet more or 

 less upon this shore, and sometimes produces a very consider- 

 able surf. The sea breezes usually prevailed from about nine or 

 ten, a. m. to four or five o'clock in the afternoon ; and that was 

 generally the case even when the upper current of wind came in 

 quite a different direction. I remarked on one excursion to the 



* The observations of the temperature in England wliich I have used in my 

 scale are those of Luke Howard, as published in the Jnnals. 



