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We were there in January-March, during an unusually hot and dry season, following the Harmatan and the Smokes and preceding the tornadoes and the rains; yet I never felt an oppressive day, nothing worse than Alexandria or Trieste in early August. The mornings and evenings were mostly misty; the moons were clear and the nights were tolerable.
Every traveller describes the Harmatan, and most travellers transcribe the errors touching the infusoria and their coats which Ehrenberg found at sea in the impalpable powder near the Cape Verde islands. The dry cold blast is purely local, not cosmical.
They were a complete contrast with the Harmatan, the firmament looking exceptionally high, and the sun shining hot, while a crisp, steady gale made the 'herds of Proteus' gambol and disport themselves over the long ridges thrown up by the cool plain of bright cerulean.
Next day we sighted the 'Garraway-trees, silk cottons some 200 feet high, fine marks for clearing the Cape shoals. Then came Fishtown and Rocktown, once celebrated for the exploits of Ashmun and his associates; and at 2.15 P.M. we anchored in the heavy Harmatan roll off The Cape of Palmas, called from palmy shade.
As the Senegal advanced under easy steam, we had no rolling off this roller-coast, and we greatly and regretfully enjoyed the glorious Harmatan weather, so soon about to cease. The mornings and evenings were cool and dewy, and the pale, round-faced sun seemed to look down upon us through an honest northern fog.
The authorities of Liberia, model claimants with a touch of savage mendicancy, demanded the land and back-dues from time immemorial. 'Palaver' was at last 'set' by the late lamented David Hopkins, consul for the Bights, in the presence of a British cruiser and two American ships of war. The weather resumed its old mood, a mixture in equal parts of 'Smokes' and of Harmatan or Scirocco.
The Rains end in the sickliest season of the year, when the sun, now getting the upper hand, sucks the miasmatic vapours from the soil and distributes them to mankind in the shape of ague and fever, dysentery, and a host of diseases. The Dries last from November to April, often beginning with tornadoes and ending with the Harmatan, smokes or scirocco.
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