United States or Niger ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
If we knew something of the conditions on the island, and had a certain knowledge that our comrades were in danger, the considerations I have named should not deter us from starting. But with all these things in the dark, and with the monsoons likely to break out again at any time, the question is whether we can afford to risk the safety of the enterprise because of impatience at delay."
The whole world is now a witness of the regularity of the monthly communication with England viâ the Red Sea; and the passage to and from China is made at all seasons of the year, in defiance of monsoons and all other impediments.
It is only in the open parts of the Pacific and Atlantic oceans that the true Trade-winds blow. In the Indian and China seas, and in many other portions of the great tropical belt, periodical winds, called Monsoons, are found. These shifting Trades exact the closest study from the practical navigator, in consequence of their extensive variety and seeming complication.
He described the course of the voyage from Lisbon to the East, the currents, the trade-winds and monsoons, the harbours, the islands, the shoals, the sunken rocks and dangerous quicksands, and he accompanied his work with various maps and charts, both general and special, of land and water, rarely delineated before his day, as well as by various astronomical and mathematical calculations.
In the midst of all our gaiety our little division was again put in requisition, to proceed against the strong hill-fort of Asseerghur, some three hundred miles from Saugar. The monsoons or rains had commenced, and this sudden news distressed all the ladies exceedingly; but no faint-hearted husband shammed sick to remain behind.
He had weathered the opening storm of many monsoons; but his daughter's presence wakened in him a new fear of the thunderbolts of the gods. Even as he spoke, a phosphorescent gleam sped through the trees, like a passing soul; and a threatening growl rumbled up from the South. It was the prelude.
The temperature appears to be but little lower than the plain: the wind was north-easterly; and both monsoons bring heavy rains. At Yafir, on the summit of the hill, Lieutenant Speke's thermometer showed an altitude of about 7500 feet. The people of the country do not know what ice means.
North-easters begin in September and are intermittent until the beginning of the wet season. The south-east monsoons are regular and consistent; the north-east, which precede the rainy monsoon, fitful and wayward, never continuing long in one stay, and lasting but four out of the twelve months. Rare is the wind from the west, rarer from the south-west. North-easters are a pronounced feature.
In the interior, on account of the vast jungles, except in case of thunderstorms, which are rare, there is no wind, but on the coasts one may encounter storms in the time of both the northeast and the southwest monsoons.
Yakut tells us how the ancient ships on their way to and from India tarried there during the monsoons, and he further tells us that it was twenty parasangs east of the capital. The 'Periplus' speaks of it as Moscha, Ptolemy as Abyssapolis, and the Arabs as Merbat; but as there is no harbourage actually at Merbat, it clearly could not be there.
Word Of The Day