Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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The Decrement Of The
Heat Being Nearly The Same Within The Tropics, And During The
Summer Under The Temperate Zone, The Small Difference Of Level Of
One Hundred Toises Should Produce Only A Change In The Mean
Temperature Of 1 Or 1.5 Degrees.
But we shall soon find that at
Cumanacoa the difference rises to more than four degrees.
This
coolness of the climate is sometimes the more surprising, as very
great heat is felt at Carthago (in the province of Popayan); at
Tomependa, on the bank of the river Amazon, and in the valleys of
Aragua, to the west of Caracas; though the absolute height of these
different places is between 200 and 480 toises. In plains as well
as on mountains the isothermal lines (lines of similar heat) are
not constantly parallel to the equator, or the surface of the
globe. It is the grand problem of meteorology to determine the
inflections of these lines, and to discover, amid modifications
produced by local causes, the constant laws of the distribution of
heat.
The port of Cumana is only seven nautical leagues from Cumanacoa.
It scarcely ever rains in the first-mentioned place, while in the
latter there are seven months of wintry weather. At Cumanacoa, the
dry season begins at the winter solstice, and lasts till the vernal
equinox. Light showers are frequent in the months of April, May,
and June. The dry weather then returns again, and lasts from the
summer solstice to the end of August.
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