ATMOSPHERE AND CLIMATE. 63 
it does not appear to possess the pestilential 
properties, with which the former is freighted. 
On the whole, the atmosphere of Southern 
Africa is very healthy, temperate, and pure. 
Its changes are accompanied by various indica- 
tors, which give warning of their approach, 
and so enable all to prepare against their effects. 
The upper currents of air are rare, and seldom 
bedimmed by clouds, vapours are soon absorbed 
or dispersed, while the temperature averages, 
during winter, from 50° to 60° ; and in the sum- 
mer, from 70° to 80°. The mean of the baro- 
meter is 30*18. 
The climate appears, however, to possess a 
manifest difference in the East and West of 
the Colony. The winter of the West side is 
wet, inclement, and disagreeable ; while, on the 
Eastern frontier, it is cold, dry, bracing, and 
delightful ; the summer, again, of the Eastern 
province, is wet and. stormy; whereas the West- 
ern is pleasant, dry, and salubrious. There is 
also a full month's difference in the advent of 
the seasons. The commencement of winter, for 
instance, at Cape Town and the surrounding 
districts, is in June; while, along the Eastern 
frontier of the Colony and in Kaffirland, it does 
not begin until July. 
Thunder storms visit, with great violence, 
the mountainous districts in the interior of the 
