Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 3 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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The Mean Temperature Of
The Havannah, According To Four Years Of Good Observations, Is 25.7
Degrees (20.6 Degrees R.), Only 2 Degrees Centigrade Above That Of The
Regions Of America Nearest The Equator.
The proximity of the sea
raises the mean temperature of the year on the coast; but in the
interior
Of the island, when the north winds penetrate with the same
force, and where the soil rises to the height of forty toises, the
mean temperature attains only 23 degrees (18.4 degrees R.) and does
not exceed that of Cairo and Lower Egypt. The difference between the
mean temperature of the hottest and coldest months rises to 12 degrees
in the interior of the island; at the Havannah and on the coast, to 8
degrees; at Cumana, to scarcely 3 degrees. The hottest months, July
and August, attain 28.8 degrees, at the island of Cuba, perhaps 29.5
degrees of mean temperature, as at the equator. The coldest months are
December and January; their mean temperature in the interior of the
island, is 17 degrees; at the Havannah, 21 degrees, that is, 5 to 8
degrees below the same months at the equator, yet still 3 degrees
above the hottest month at Paris.
It will be interesting to compare the climate of the Havannah with
that of Macao and Rio Janeiro; two places, one of which is near the
limit of the northern torrid zone, on the eastern coast of Asia; and
the other on the eastern coast of America, towards the extremity of
the southern torrid zone.
The climate of the Havannah, notwithstanding the frequency of the
north and north-west winds, is hotter than that of Macao and Rio
Janeiro. The former partakes of the cold which, owing to the frequency
of the west winds, is felt in winter along all the eastern coast of a
great continent. The proximity of spaces of land covered with
mountains and table-lands renders the distribution of heat in
different months of the year more unequal at Macao and Canton than in
an island bounded on the west and north by the hot waters of the
Gulf-stream. The winters are therefore much colder at Canton and Macao
than at the Havannah: yet the latitude of Macao is 1 degree more
southerly than that of the Havannah; and the latter town and Canton
are, within nearly a minute, on the same parallel. The thermometer at
Canton has sometimes almost reached the point zero; and by the effect
of reflection, ice has been found on the terraces of houses. Although
this great cold never lasts more than one day, the English merchants
residing at Canton like to make chimney-fires in their apartments from
November to January; while at the Havannah, the artificial warmth even
of a brazero is not required. Hail is frequent and the hail-stones are
extremely large in the Asiatic climate of Canton and Macao, while it
is scarcely seen once in fifteen years at the Havannah.
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