28 RESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA. 
the flesh—as if rushing from a hot oven. In one team of ten 
horses, three fell in the road, from heat; two died, but the 
other recovered by pouring sweet oil in its throat. The ani- 
mal’s throat was closed so that it could not drink, when the 
oil was used so-as to soften the throat and open it, that it 
could swallow water, when it recovered. The two that died 
expired before such aid could be used with them. At Burton’s 
public house, at Loving’s Ferry, birds flew into the bar-room 
to the pitcher to get water, so tame were they made by the 
thirst caused by extreme heat. Birds were seen to fall dead 
off the limbs of trees in the middle of the day, from the heat, 
as if they were shot. The wind was of that burning heat never 
before witnessed by the settlers there since their arrival in the 
state.” 7 
In the Sierra Nevada, the heat of the summer at mid-day 
is about the same as in the Sacramento valley; but the winter 
is cold, and the amount of rain greater in proportion to the 
altitude above the sea. In places three thousand feet above 
the ocean-level, ice forms five and six inches thick, and snow 
deep enough for sleighing lies several weeks nearly every win- 
ter. In towns six thousand feet above the sea, the snow falls 
from five to ten feet deep, and covers the ground four or five 
months in the year. 
In the Great Basin, the winters are cold and the summer 
days very hot; but there too the nights are always cool. 
The Colorado Desert has exceedingly hot summer days and 
warm winters, but occasional frosts in the spring and fall as 
well as in the winter. 
§ 26. Comparative Tubles—The following table shows the 
nican temperature of every month, and the average of the 
whole year, at San Francisco, Benicia, Sacramento, Fort Mil- 
ler, Fort Reading, Fort Yuma, and also at various places in 
other parts of the world, some of them (such 2s Funchal, Na- 
ples, Honolulu, and Mexico) being famed for the beauty and 
equability of their climates. In addition to the temperature, 
the latitude of each place is given: 
