PDF - Wallace Online

i CLIMATE AND ASPECTS OF THE EQUATORIAL ZONE 235of excessive violence, as might in fact be inferred from theextreme steadiness of the barometer, whose daily range atBatavia rarely exceeds one -eighth of an inch, while theextreme range during three years was less than one-third ofan inch ! The amount of the rainfall isvery great, seventyor eighty inches in a year being a probable average ;and asthe larger part of this occurs during three or four months,individual rainfalls are often exceedingly heavy. The greatestfall recorded at Batavia during three years was three inchesand eighteenths in one 1 hour, but this was quite exceptional,and even half this quantity is very unusual. The greatestrainfall recorded in twenty-four hours is seven inches and aquarter but more than four inches in one ;day occurs only ontwo or three occasions in a year. The blue colour of thesky is probably not so intense as in many parts of thetemperate zone, while the brilliancy of the moon and stars isnot perceptibly greater than on our clearest frosty nights, andisundoubtedly much inferior to what is witnessed in manydesert regions, and even in Southern Europe.On the whole, then, we must decide that uniformity andabundance, rather than any excessive manifestations, are theprevailing characteristic of all the climatal phenomena of theequatorial zone.Concluding EemarhWe cannot better conclude our account of the equatorialclimate than by quoting the following vivid descriptionof the physical phenomena which occur during the earlypart of the dry season at Para. It is taken from Mr. Bates'Naturalist on the Amazons, and clearly exhibits some ofthe more characteristic features of a typical equatorialday."At that early period of the firstday (the two hoursafter sunrise) the sky was invariably cloudless, the thermometermarking 72 or 73 Fahr.; the heavy dew or the previousnight's rain, which lay on the moist foliage, becoming quicklydissipated by the glowing sun, which, rising straight out of theeast, mounted rapidly towards the zenith. All nature wasfresh, new leaf and flower-buds expanding rapidly. The. . .1On 10th January 1867, from 1 to 2 A.M.