Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America, During the Year 1799-1804 — Volume 3Humboldt, Alexander von
History
Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America, During the Year 1799-1804 — Volume 3
Humboldt, Alexander von
Natural history -- South America; Scientific expeditions; South America -- Description and travel
The climate of the Havannah is in accordance with the extreme limits
of the torrid zone: it is a tropical climate, in which a more unequal
distribution of heat at different parts of the year denotes the
passage to the climates of the temperate zone. Calcutta (latitude 22
degrees 34 minutes north), Canton (latitude 23 degrees 8 minutes
north), Macao (latitude 22 degrees 12 minutes north), the Havannah
(latitude 23 degrees 9 minutes north) and Rio Janeiro (latitude 22
degrees 54 minutes south) are places which, from their position at the
level of the ocean near the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn,
consequently at an equal distance from the equator, afford great
facilities for the study of meteorology. This study can only advance
by the determination of certain numerical elements which are the
indispensable basis of the laws we seek to discover. The aspect of
vegetation being identical near the limits of the torrid zone and at
the equator, we are accustomed to confound vaguely the climates of two
zones comprised between 0 and 10 degrees, and between 15 and 23
degrees of latitude. The region of palm-trees, bananas and arborescent
gramina extends far beyond the two tropics: but it would be dangerous
to apply what has been observed at the extremity of the tropical zone
to what may take place in the plains near the equator. In order to
rectify those errors it is important that the mean temperature of the
year and months be well known, as also the thermometric oscillations
in different seasons at the parallel of the Havannah; and to prove by
an exact comparison with other points alike distant from the equator,
for instance, with Rio Janeiro and Macao, that the lowering of
temperature observed in the island of Cuba is owing to the irruption
and the stream of layers of cold air, borne from the temperate zones
towards the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. 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
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