A lecture on the geography of plants / By John Barton.

  • John Barton
Date:
1827
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A lecture on the geography of plants / By John Barton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    becomes vertical in returning towards the equa- tor, (that is, during the time answering to summer in the temperate zone,) the country, in most parts of the tropical regions, is deluged with almost continual rain, while the other part of the year is a season of fine weather. A similar equability of climate is found to prevail in those districts which are situated far above the level of the sea, but of course accom- panied by a lower temperature. Thus the mean temperature of Quito, directly under the equator, at a height of eight thousand feet, cor- responds nearly with that of the South of France; but the lowest point which the ther- mometer has been observed to indicate at Quito is 42°; whereas at Marseilles, though the cli- mate there is less liable to great fluctuations than in most places under the same latitude, the mercury sinks occasionally as low as 23° The temperature of that great elevated plain which occupies the western side of the continent of South America resembles a perpetual spring; and as very little difference is felt in the warmth of the different seasons, the gradual diminution of heat from the level of the sea upwards is more distinctly observable than in other cli- * These temperatures are all taken from Humboldt’s Lignes Isothermes,