§ 515, 516. THE CLOUD REGION, ETC. 277 



of equatorial calms and rains, the navigator feels the weather to 

 become singularly close and oppressive ; he discovers here that 

 the elasticity of feeling which he breathed from the trade-wind 

 air has forsaken him ; he has entered the doldrums, and is under 

 the ''cloud-ring." 



515. I find in the journal of the late Commodore Arthur Sin- 

 A frigate under the ^lair, kept ou board the United States frigate Con ■ 

 cloud-ring. gress duriug a cruise to South America in 1817-18, 

 a picture of the weather under this cloud-ring that is singularly 

 graphic and striking. He encountered it in the month of Janu- 

 ary, 1818, between the parallel of 4° north and the equator, and 

 between the meridians of 19° and 23° west. He says of it, " This 

 is certainly one of the most unjoleasant regions in our globe. A 

 dense, close atmosphere, except for a few hours after a thunder- 

 storm, during which time torrents of rain fall, when the air be- 

 comes a little refreshed ; but a hot, glowing sun soon heats it 

 again, and but for your awnings, and the little air put in circu- 

 lation by the continual flapping of the ship's sails, it would be al- 

 most insufferable. No person who has not crossed this region 

 can form an adequate idea of its unpleasant effects. You feel a 

 degree of lassitude unconquerable, which not even the sea-bathing, 

 which every where else proves so salutary and renovating, can 

 dispel. Except when in actual danger of shipwreck, I never 

 spent twelve more disagreeable days in the professional part of 

 my life than in these calm latitudes. I crossed the line on the 

 17th of January, at eight A.M., in longitude 21° 20', and soon 

 found I had surmounted all the difficulties consequent to that 

 event; that the breeze continued to freshen and draw round to 

 the south -southeast, bringing with it a clear sky and most heav- 

 enly temperature, renovating and refreshing beyond description. 

 Nothing was now to be seen but cheerful countenances, exchanged 

 as by enchantment from that sleepy sluggishness which had borne 

 us all down for the last two weeks." 



516. One need not go to sea to perceive the grand work which 

 Subject? which at pea thc clouds Dcrform in collecting moisture from the 



present themselves |- n ^ ^ ' ' ^ ^^ • 



for contemplation, crystal vaults of thc sky, in sprinkling it upon the 

 fields, and making the hills glad with showers of rain. Winter 

 and summer, "the clouds drop fatness upon the earth." This 

 part of their office is obvious to all, and I do not propose to con- 



