*
[footnote] *According to Boussingault ('Economie Rurale', t. ii., p. 693),
the mean quantity of rain that fell at Marmato (latitude 5 degrees 27',
altitude 4675 feet, and mean temperature 69 degrees) in the years 1833 and
1834 was 64 inches, while at Santa Fe de Bogota (latitude 4 degrees 36',
altitude 8685 feet, and mean temperature 58 degrees) it only amounted to 39
1/2 inches.
My South American fellow-traveler, Caldas, found that, at Santa Fe de
Bogota, at an elevation of almost 8700 feet, it did not exceed 37 inches,
being consequently little more than on some parts of the western shore of
Europe. Boussingault occasionally observed at Quito that Saussure's
hygrometer receded to 26 degrees with a temperature of from 53.6 degrees to
55.4 degrees. Gay-Lussac saw the same hygrometer standing at 25.3 degrees
in his great aerostatic ascent in a stratum of air 7034 feet high, and with
a temperature of 39.2 degrees. The greatest dryness that has yet been
observed on the surface of the globe in the low lands is probably that which
Gustav Rose, Ehrenberg, and myself found in Northern Asia, between the
valleys of the Irtisch and the Oby. In the Steppe of Platowskaja, after
southwest winds had blown for a long time from the interior of the
Continent, with a temperature of 74.
Pages:
673
674
675
676
677
678
679
680
681
682
683
684
685
686
687
688
689
690
691
692
693
694
695
696
697