Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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A Serenity, Uninterrupted During A Great Part Of
The Year, Prevails Only In The Low Regions At The Level Of The Sea,
And At Considerable Heights On Those Vast Table-Lands, Where The
Uniform Radiation Of The Soil Seems To Contribute To The Perfect
Dissolution Of Vesicular Vapours.
The intermediate zone is at the
same height as the first strata of clouds which surround the
surface of the earth; and the climate of this zone, the temperature
of which is so mild, is essentially misty and variable.
Notwithstanding the elevation of the spot, the sky is generally
less blue at Caracas than at Cumana. The aqueous vapour is less
perfectly dissolved; and here, as in our climates, a greater
diffusion of light diminishes the intensity of the aerial colour,
by introducing white into the blue of the air. This intensity,
measured with the cyanometer of Saussure, was found from November
to January generally 18, never above 20 degrees. On the coasts it
was from 22 to 25 degrees. I remarked, in the village of Caracas,
that the wind of Petare sometimes contributes singularly to give a
pale tint to the celestial vault. On the 22nd of January, the blue
of the sky was at noon in the zenith feebler than I ever saw it in
the torrid zone.* (* At noon, thermometer in the shade 23.7 (in the
sun, out of the wind, 30.4 degrees); De Luc's hygrometer, 36.2;
cyanometer, at the zenith, 12, at the horizon 9 degrees.
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