ill the Temperature of Winter. 57 



which grow in Italy, except the fig and the olive. Italy, 

 it is agreed, produced figs, olives, and various kinds of 

 wine. " l..atium," sa3's Strabo, lib. 5. " enjoys a mild 

 climate and produces all kinds of fruits [^r^.w-Pa^os]] ex- 

 cepting the marshy lands on the sea coast, and some 

 mountainous ti'acts ; but even these produce abundant 

 pasturage, many kinds of fruits, and even one excellent 

 kind of wine." 



Strabo, in his second book, makes very coiTect and 

 judicious remarks on climate ; stating that mountainous 

 regions are colder than valleys and low plains. He men- 

 tions Bagadania, an elevated plain between mount Tau- 

 rus and Argea, which produced scarcely any fruit trees, 

 altho situated 3000 stadiums south of the Euxine, where, 

 at Sinope, the country produced olives. 'This circum- 

 stance has not been sufficiently considered in estimating 

 the descriptions of climates and seasons, in ancient au- 

 thors. Strabo then observes, that upon the Boristhenes, 

 now the Neiper, and in that part of Celtica which is con- 

 tiguous to the Gcean^ the vine either will not grow or not 

 produce fruit. Celtica was that part of Gaul which is 

 comprehended between the Garonne and the Seine.... 

 Cesar. Com, lib. 1. Now let it be remarked, that the 

 vine is cultivated at this day, in the maritime part of 

 France, to a very little distance north of the Loire, in the 

 48th degree of latitude, altho, in the interior country, 

 it is cultivated with success to the 50th degree. Strabo's 

 assertion therefore, with regai^d to Gaul, is almost lite- 

 rally verified by modern facts.* 



Strabo then mentions the climate on the north of the 

 Euxine, and the fact that, at the mouth of the Palus 

 Maeotis, a general of Mithridates, with a body of horse, 

 defeated the barbarians upon tlie ice, on the xi^vy spot, 

 where in summer he defeated them in a naval engage- 

 ment. 



A fact of this sort is of no effect in settling the ques- 

 tion respecting a change of climate, because we know 



* See Young's Tour in France, vol. ii. ch. 3. and his map of the 

 climate. Puusanias informs us that olives grew in Tithoreu on mount 



Parnassus, which is in the 39lh degree of latitude Phocics. ch. 32, 



I 



