132 



MEXICO, CENTRAL AMERICA, W^ST INDIES. 



diflBcult to find a favourable site on such an inhospitable coast, studded with shoals, 

 and surrounded by arid or sandy flats and marshy wastes. Medanos, or dunes, raise 

 their yellowish slopes immediately beyond the outskirts of the city, changing their 

 form and positions with every storm ; under the influence of the north winds, some ' 

 of these sandhills rise to a height of 160 or 170 feet. 



Seen from a distance Vera Cruz, surrounded by all these medanos, presents a 



Fig. 53. — Successive Displacements of Vera Cetjz. 

 Scale 1 : 600,000. 



96°20- 



We = l 0? Greenw'icl-' 



Depths- 



0to5 

 Fathoms. 



5 Fathoms 

 and upwards. 



12 Miles 



far from attractive appearance ; hence most travellers not detained by business, and 

 aware of its evil reputation as a hotbed of fever, pass rapidly on to the more agree- 

 able cities of the interior, especially in the hot season when " yellow jack " prevails 

 on this seaboard. The epidemic is said to have carried off 2,000 persons in 1862 in 

 the Ciudad de los Miieiios, " City of the Dead," as it is called in Mexico. Neverthe- 



