Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
- Page 544 of 779 - First - Home
I
Remained A Part Of The Night Seated In A Balcony, From Which I Had
A View Of A Great Part Of The Horizon.
In every climate I feel a
peculiar interest in fixing my eyes, when the sky is serene, on
some great constellation, and seeing groups of vesicular vapours
appear and augment, as around a central nucleus, then,
disappearing, form themselves anew.
After the 28th of October, the reddish mist became thicker than it
had previously been. The heat of the nights seemed stifling, though
the thermometer rose only to 26 degrees. The breeze, which
generally refreshed the air from eight or nine o'clock in the
evening, was no longer felt. The atmosphere was burning hot, and
the parched and dusty ground was cracked on every side. On the 4th
of November, about two in the afternoon, large clouds of peculiar
blackness enveloped the high mountains of the Brigantine and the
Tataraqual. They extended by degrees as far as the zenith. About
four in the afternoon thunder was heard over our heads, at an
immense height, not regularly rolling, but with a hollow and often
interrupted sound. At the moment of the strongest electric
explosion, at 4 hours 12 minutes, there were two shocks of
earthquake, which followed each other at the interval of fifteen
seconds. The people ran into the streets, uttering loud cries. M.
Bonpland, who was leaning over a table examining plants, was almost
thrown on the floor. I felt the shock very strongly, though I was
lying in a hammock.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 544 of 779
Words from 147970 to 148225
of 211363
