EED FOGS AXD SEA EEEEZES. 143 



hoocT of a not wholly dried-up pool. ... At length, after tlie long 

 drought, the welcome season of the rain arrives ; and then how 

 suddenly is the scene changed ! . . . Hardly has the surface 

 of the earth received the refi'eshing moisture, when the previously 

 terren steppe begins to exhale sweet odours, and to clothe itself 

 with killingias, and a variety of grasses. The herbaceous mimosas, 

 with renewed sensibility to the influence of hght, mifold their 

 droopmg, slumbering leaves to greet the rising sun ; and the early 

 song of birds and the opening blossoms of the water-plants join to 

 salute the mornmg." 



327. The arid plains and deserts, as well as high moimtain 

 Are the great de- rangos, havc, it mav well be supposed, an influence 



serts centres of cir- n , f> n "'•■'•. • i 



cuiation? upon the movements oi the great aerial ocean, as 



shoals and other obstructions have upon the channels of circula- 

 tion in the sea. The deserts of Asia, for instance, produce (§ 299) 

 a disturbance upon the grand system of atmospherical chculation, 

 which, m summer and autunm, is felt in Europe, in Liberia, and 

 away out upon "^^h^ Indian Ocean, as far as the parallel of the 10th 

 degree of south latitude. There is an indi'aught from all these regions 

 towards these deserts. These indraughts are kno^Ti as monsoons at 

 sea ; on the land, as the prevaihng winds of the season. Imagine the 

 area within which this indraught is felt, and let us ask a question 

 or two, hoping for ansvrers. The air which the indraught brings 

 into the desert places, and which, being heated, rises up there, 

 whither does it go ? It rises up in a column a few miles high and 

 many in chcumference, we know, and we can imagine that it is like 

 a shaft many times thicker than it is tall ; but how is it crovvaied ? 

 Is it crooned like the stem of a mushroom, with an efilorescence 

 or ebulhtion of heated au' flaiing over and spreading out in all 

 directions, and, then gradually thinning out as an upper cmTent, 

 extending even unto the verge of the area whence the indi'aught 

 is drawn ? If so, does it then descend and return to the desert 

 plains as an indraught agam ? Then these desei^t places -would 

 constitute centres of chcidation for the monsoon period; and if 

 they were such centres, whence vvould these winds get the vapour 

 for their rains m Europe and Asia ? Or, histead of the mushroom 

 shape, and the flare at the top in all directions from centre to 

 circumference, does the uprising column, hke one of those subma- 

 rme fountauis which are said to be in the Guh Stream otl* the 

 coast of Elorida, bubble up and join in with the flow of the 

 upper current? The right answers and explanations to thes^ 



