Volume 4

Travels in various countries of Europe, Asia and Africa / By Edward Daniel Clarke.

  • Clarke, Edward Daniel, 1769-1822.
Date:
1816-1824
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Travels in various countries of Europe, Asia and Africa / By Edward Daniel Clarke. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    33/490 (page 15)
    mercury, exposed to its full current, rose six degrees of Fahrenheit in two minutes, from eighty to eighty-six; a singular consequence of north- east wind to Englishmen, accustomed to consider this as the: coldest to which their island is exposed. All the coast of Cyprus, from Salines to Famagosta, antiently SaLamis, 1s liable to hot winds, from almost every point of the compass; from the north-east; from the east; from the south-east; from the south; and south-west: The north-east, coming from the parched deserts of Curdistan; the east, from the sands of Palmyra; the south-east, from the great desert of Aralia; and the south, and south-west, from Egypt and Lylia., From the west, north-west, and north, the inhabitants are barred by high mountains, lying open to the beams of a scorching sun, reflected. from a ‘soil so white, that the glare is often sufficient to cause temporary blindness, without even the prospect of a single tree, beneath which one might hope for shade. In the middle: of the day few animals are seen in motion, except the lizard, seeming to sport with greatest pleasure where the sun is most. power- ful; anda ispecies of long -black serpents, abounding in Cyprus: one of these, which we killed, measured four feet and three inches in length. Sometimes, also, a train of camels may be noticed, grazing among dusty thistles and