SUPPLEMENTAL HISTORY OF MAN. 125 



similar severity of cold. The Danes have lived in 

 72° north-latitude in Greenland ; and the Dutch under 

 Heemskirk wintered at Nova Zembla, in 76° north- 

 latitude. 



On the other hand the capacity of man to endure 

 intense heat is not less remarkable than his power 

 of sustaining cold. Notwithstanding the assertion 

 of Boerhaave, that a temperature from 96° to 100°, 

 would be fatal to the human species, yet the mean 

 temperature of Sierra Leone is 84° of Fahrenheit, 

 and at some distance from the coast, the thermo- 

 meter has been seen at 100°, and even 102° and 

 103° in the shade, as we read in Winterbottom's 

 account of the native Africans. Adanson re- 

 ports its being at 108|° in the shade at Senegal in 

 17° north-latitude. Buffon mentions a case of its 

 having reached to 117j°. It is probable that the 

 country, to the west of the great desert, is still 

 hotter than Senegal, from its being exposed to 

 the action of the burning winds that have blown 

 across its surface. In Sicily the thermometer rises 

 to 112° at times. In South Carolina it has been 

 seen at 115° in the shade, and Humboldt saw it at 

 110° to 115° in the immense Llanos near the river 

 Oroonoco. 



Thus it appears that man can sustain all the 

 degrees of heat and cold felt in this planet. Nor is 

 his capacity less for supporting the varieties of 

 atmospheric pressure. We reckon that at the 

 level of the sea the average pressure of the at- 



