14 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



From the works of one of these authors I shall cite a descrip- 

 tion of a tropical day. And as you examine the peculiarities of 

 an equatorial day, you will remember that near the Tropic of 

 Cancer and the Troj)ic of Capricorn the climate is by no means as 

 ■equable as that near the Equator. Wide ranges in temperature 

 and rain may come in with the changing seasons, and annual 

 vegetation may go down even to the verge of extinction, as is 

 now the deplorable case in parts of the south and middle of 

 India. Bearing this in mind, we may consider the equatorial 

 day. I quote from Mr. Bates, the naturalist in Nicaragua. He 

 begins with the morning, in which there is no twilight. Day is 

 not ushered in by dawn as with us. 



"At that early period of the day [the first tw^o hours after sun- 

 rise] the sky was invariably cloudless, the thermometer marking 

 seventy-two degrees or seventy-three degrees Fahrenheit; the 

 heavy dew of the previous night's rain, which lay on the moist 

 foliage, becoming quickly dissipated by the glowing sun, which, 

 rising straight out of the east, mounted rapidly toward the zenith. 

 All nature was fresh, new leaf and flower-buds expanding rapidly. 

 . . . The heat increased hourly, and towards two o'clock 

 reached ninety-two degrees to ninety-three degrees Fahrenheit, 

 by wliich time every voice of bird and mammal was hushed. 

 The leaves, which were so moist and fresh in early morning, now 

 became lax and drooping, and Howers shed their petals. On 

 most days in June and July a heavy shower would fall some- 

 time in the afternoon, producing a most welcome coolness. The 

 approach of the rain-clouds was after a uniform fashion very 

 interesting to observe. First, the cool sea-breeze which had 

 commenced to blow about ten o'clock, and which had increased 

 in force with the increasing power of the sun, would flag and 

 finally die away. The heat and electric tension of the atmos- 

 phere would then become almost insupportable. Languor and 

 uneasiness would seize on everyone, even the denizens of the 

 forest betraying it by their motions. White clouds would 

 appear in the east and gather into cumuli, with an increasing 

 blackness along their lower portions. The whole eastern hori- 

 zon would become almost suddenly black, and this would spread 

 upwards, the sun at length becoming obscured. Then the rush 

 of a mighty wind is heard through the forest, swaying the tree- 

 tops ; a vivid flash of lightning bursts forth, then a crash of 



