98 



THE ATMOSPHERE— CLIMATE. 



and intersect each other. Such is the spirit of 

 the method, by which I flatter myself it will 

 one day become possible to connect immeasu- 

 rable series of apparently isolated facts with 

 one another, by empirical numerically expressed 

 laws, and to demonstrate the necessity of their 

 mutual dependence. 



As we find westerly or west-south-westerly 

 winds in both temperate zones as the prevail- 

 ing counter-currents to the trades or east winds 

 of the tropics, and as these, to a country with 

 an eastern sea-board, are land winds, and to a 

 country with a western sea-board again are 

 sea winds (i. e. as they blow over a level, which 

 by reason of its mass and the descent of the 

 cooled particles of water is susceptible of no | 

 great degree of chilling) ; so comes it that, i 

 where oceanic currents running near the shore ' 

 do not influence the temperature, the east 

 coasts of continents are colder than the west 

 coasts. Cook's junior companion in his second 

 voyage, the gifted George Forster, whom I have 

 to thank for urging me on to various extensive 

 undertakings, was the first who directed par- 

 ticular attention to the difference of tempera- 

 ture of the east and west coasts in both hemi- 

 spheres, as well as to the correspondence be- 

 tween the temperature of the west coasts of 

 North America in the middle latitudes, with 

 that of the west of Europe within the same 

 parallels("»). 



Accurate observations show a striking differ- 

 ence even in pretty high northern latitudes 

 between the mean annual temperature of the 

 east and west sea-boards of America. At Nain 

 in Labrador (57° 10' N. lat.) this temperature 

 is 3° 8 C [5°16 F.] under the freezing point of 

 water [i. e. 26°-8 F.], whilst at New Archangel 

 on the north-west shore of Russian America 

 (57° 3' N. lat.) it is still 6°-9 C. [12°-4 F.] above 

 the freezing point [i. e. 44° -4 F.]. At the first 

 named place the mean summer temperature 

 scarcely reaches 6° -2 C. [43° 1 F.], whilst at 

 the second it is as high as 13°-8 C. [56°-5 F.]. 

 The mean winter temperature of Pekin (39° 54' 

 N. lat.) is at least 3° C. below the freezing point ; 

 whilst in the west of Europe, even at Paris 

 (48° 50' N. lat.), it is fully 3° 3 C. above this 

 point. The mean winter cold of Pekin is thus 

 lower by 2*^-5 C. than that of Copenhagen, 

 which lies 17 degrees of latitude farther to the 

 north. 



We have already spoken of the extreme 

 slowness with which the great masses of the 

 ocean follow alterations in the temperature of 

 the air, and how in virtue of this property the 

 ocean acts as an equalizer of temperature. It 

 tempers at once the rudeness of the winter's 

 cold and the fervour of the summer's heat. 

 Frohi hence a second important contrast : the 

 difference between the insular or sea-board cli- 

 mates which all deeply indented continents 

 abounding in bays and peninsulas enjoy, and 

 the climates of the interior of great masses of 

 terra firma. This remarkable contrast, in the 

 variety of its phenomena, in its influence on 

 the power of vegetation, and the improvement 

 of agriculture, on the transparency of the at- 

 mosphere, the radiation of the earth's surface 

 and the height of the line of perpetual snow, 

 was first fully developed in the writings of 

 Leopold von Buch. In the interior of the Asi- 



atic continent, Tobolsk, Barnaul on the Obi 

 and Irkutsk, have summers like those of Ber- 

 lin, Munster and Cherbourg in Normandy ; but 

 these summers are followed by winters in which 

 the coldest month reaches the fearful mean 

 temperature of from —18° to —20° C. [0° 4 to 

 — 4"^ F.]. In the summer months, again, the 

 thermometer for weeks together is seen stand- 

 ing at 30° and 31° C. [86° and 87°-8 F.]. Such 

 continental climates are therefore well and prop- 

 erly characterized as excessive by Buffon, who 

 was so well versed both in mathematics and 

 in physics ; artd the inhabitants of the countries 

 where they prevail, seem doomed, like the un- 

 fortunates in Dante's Purgat()ry("'^), 



" a soffrir tormenti caldi e geli."* 



In no quarter of the globe, not even in the 

 Canary Islands or in Spain, or the South of 

 France, have I met with more delicious fruit, 

 particularly more beautiful grapes, than in As- 

 trachan, near the shores of the Caspian Sea 

 (46° 21' N. lat.). With a mean annual temper- 

 ature of about 9° C. [about 48|° F.], the mean 

 summer temperature rises to 21°-2 C. [70°-l 

 F.], equal to that of Bordeaux ; whilst not only 

 there, but still farther to th« south, at Kislar 

 on the mouth of the Texel, in the latitudes of 

 Avignon and Rimini, the thermometer in the 

 winter season sinks to — 25° and — 30° C. 

 [—13° and —22° F.] 



Ireland, Guernsey and Jersey, the Peninsula 

 of Brittany, the coasts of Normandy, and the 

 South of England, in the mildness of their win- 

 ters and the low temperature and overcast sky 

 of their summers, present the most remarkable 

 contrasts with the continental climate of the 

 interior of the east of Europe. In the north- 

 east of Ireland (54° 56' N. lat.), under the same 

 parallel as Konigsberg in Prussia, the myrtle 

 grows as vigorously as it does in Portugal. 

 The month of August, the temperature of 

 which in Hungary is 21° C, is scarcely 16° C. 

 in Dublin, which stands on the same isother- 

 mal line of 9P ; and the mean winter temper- 

 ature, which sinks in Buda to — 2°-4 C, in 

 Dublin (with its mean annual temperature, 

 lower by 9° C.) is still 4° -3 above the freezing 

 point of water ; i. e., it is 2° C. higher than in 

 Milan, Pavia, Padua, and the whole of Lom- 

 bardy, where the mean annual temperature is 

 fully 12°-7 C. At Stromness in the Orkneys, 

 not half a degree further to the south than 

 Stockholm, the mean winter temperature is 4° 

 C, higher consequently than that of Paris, and 

 nearly equal to that of London. Even in the 

 Faro Islands in 62° N. latitude, the influence 

 of the westerly winds and of the ocean is such, 

 that the water of the inland lakes never free- 

 zes. On the pleasant coasts of Devonshire, 

 where Salcombe, by reason of its mild climate, 

 has been called the Montpellier of the North, 

 the Agave Mexicana has been seen flowering 

 in the open air, and Oranges, trained as espa- 

 liers, and scarcely protected for a few weeks 

 with mats, have borne fruit. There, as well 

 as at Penzance and Gosport, and Cherbourg 

 on the NornAn coast, the mean winter tem- 

 perature is as high as 5° -5 C, that is to say, 

 but l°-3 below the temperature of the corre- 



[* " From beds of raging fire to starve in ice." 



Milton, after Dant\ 

 I though the English poet lays the scene in his Hell.— T»,l 



