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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We Left Madrid About The Middle Of May, Crossed A Part Of Old
Castile, The Kingdoms Of Leon And Galicia, And Reached Corunna,
Whence We Were To Embark For Cuba.
The winter having been
protracted and severe, we enjoyed during the journey that mild
temperature of the spring, which in so southern a latitude usually
occurs during March and April.
The snow still covered the lofty
granitic tops of the Guadarama; but in the deep valleys of Galicia,
which resemble the most picturesque spots of Switzerland and the
Tyrol, cistuses loaded with flowers; and arborescent heaths clothed
every rock. We quitted without regret the elevated plain of the two
Castiles, which is everywhere devoid of vegetation, and where the
severity of the winter's cold is followed by the overwhelming heat
of summer. From the few observations I personally made, the
interior of Spain forms a vast plain, elevated three hundred toises
(five hundred and eighty-four metres) above the level of the ocean,
is covered with secondary formations, grit-stone, gypsum, sal-gem,
and the calcareous stone of Jura. The climate of the Castiles is
much colder than that of Toulon and Genoa; its mean temperature
scarcely rises to 15 degrees of the centigrade thermometer.
We are astonished to find that, in the latitude of Calabria,
Thessaly, and Asia Minor, orange-trees do not flourish in the open
air. The central elevated plain is encircled by a low and narrow
zone, where the chamaerops, the date-tree, the sugar-cane, the
banana, and a number of plants common to Spain and the north of
Africa, vegetate on several spots, without suffering from the
rigours of winter.
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