Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 4.djvu/26



Stretching north and south a total distance of over 720 miles between the sixth and seventeenth parallels of northern latitude, and presenting a series of terraces rising to a height of over 6,000 feet, the Angola territory naturally offers a great diversity of climate. But although the meteorological conditions and all the corresponding phenomena are modified with the latitude and relief of the

land, the actual extremes of temperature are but slight in the several physical zones. Hence travellers suffer quite as much from the fiery solar rays on the elevated plateaux of the interior as on the low-lying coastlands. The thermometric differences, however, become more pronounced with the alternating seasons of heat and cold, according as we advance farther from the equator and from the seaboard. The local variations of climate due to accidental conditions are often very great and extremely dangerous to strangers. In some of the upland districts