TEMPERATURE OF CHINA. 25 



of the warmest month is +30, 5, as it is at Cairo, situated in 30; 

 and the temperature of the coldest month is 5 to 8 degrees above 

 zero ; sometimes the thermometer descends to 3, results which 

 correspond with the winters of Marseilles, situated in 43 of latitude. 

 At Macao in 22 of latitude, La Perouse has found -}-15 , 5 for 

 the mean temperature of January, and which is observed equally 

 at Algiers, much more north than Macao ; and the mean tempera- 

 ture of the Chinese city being superior by 2 to that of Algiers, the 

 summer ought to be there sensibly warmer. 



Recent observations confirm these variations between the tem- 

 peratures of winter and summer in China. Thus, in 1816, dur- 

 ing the return of the Ambassador of Lord Amherst, a series of 

 thermometrical observations made in the month of September, 

 between the 38 and 35 of latitude, give 23, 58 for the mean 

 temperature of this month, and which is equally remarked in our 

 Provence. In 1820, at Timkowski, in Mongolia, in 40 to 45 of 

 latitude, in the month of October and November the thermometer 

 descended from 10 to 15 degrees below zero. A French Mission- 

 ary established in 1833 in East Tartary, at Si-wang, in 41, 39' of 

 latitude, relates extraordinary differences between the temperatures 

 of summer and winter. According to him, the thermometer rises to 

 37 5 centigrades in summer, and descends to 37 5, below zero in 

 winter. " During this last season spirits-of-wine only remained liquid, 

 and when a metal is touched with moist hands, the epidermis of the 

 fingers remains attached thereto."* In conclusion, a useful remark 

 upon the temperature of the central provinces is furnished us by a 

 Missionary who has lived ten years in China, and which limits the 

 cultivation of the orange to the 30th degree of latitude, while in 

 Provence we have orange trees as high as the 43d degree. 



From the data furnished by the original texts upon the production 

 * Annals of the Propagation of Faith, Nos. 40 and 50. 

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