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the province of Mechoacan. According to my 

 measures, this height of the town, situate in 

 19° 42' of latitude, is only a thousand toises : 

 and yet, a few years before our arrival in New 

 Spain, the streets were covered with snow for 

 some hours. 



Snow has been seen to fall also at Teneriffe, 

 in a place lying above Esperanza de la Laguna, 

 very near the town of this name, in the gardens 

 of which the artocarpus flourishes. This extra- 

 ordinary fact was confirmed to Mr. Broussonet 

 by very aged persons. The erica arborea, the 

 myrica faya, and the arbutus callicarpa*, did 

 not suffer from this snow ; but it destroyed all 

 the swine in the open air. This observation is 

 interesting to vegetable physiology. In hot 

 countries, the plants are so vigorous, that cold 

 is less injurious to them, provided it be of short 

 duration. I have seen the banana cultivated in 

 the island of Cuba, in places where the thermo- 

 meter descends to seven centesimal degrees, and 

 sometimes very near the freezing point. In Italy 

 and Spain the orange and date trees do not perish, 

 though the cold during the night is two degrees 

 below the freezing point. In general it is re- 

 marked by cultivators, that the trees which grow 

 in a fertile soil are less delicate, and consequent- 



* This fine arbutus, imported by Mr. Broussonet, is very 

 different from the arbutus laurtfolia, with which it has been 

 confounded, and which belongs to North America. 



