Page:The City of the Saints.djvu/294

276 The climate of the Basin has been compared with that of the Tartar plains of High Asia. Spring opens in the valleys with great suddenness; all is bloom and beauty below, while the snowline creeps lingeringly up the mountain side, and does not disappear till the middle of June. Thus there are but three months of warmth in the high lands; the low lands have four, beginning with a May-day like that of England. At the equinoxes, both vernal and autumnal, there are rains in the bottoms, which in the upper levels become sleet or snow. Between April and October showers are rare; there are, however, exceptions, heavy downfalls, with thunder, lightning, and hail. "Clouds without water" is a proverbial expression; a dark, heavy pall, which in woodland countries would burst with its weight, here sails over the arid, sun-parched surface, and discharges its watery stores in the kanyons and upon the mountains.. During the first few years after the arrival of the Saints there was little rain either in spring or autumn; in 1860 it extended to the middle of June. The change may be attributed to cultivation and plantation; thus also may be explained the North American Indian's saying that the pale-face brings with him his rain. The same has been observed in Kansas and New Mexico, and is equally remarked by the natives of Cairo, the Aden Coal-hole, and Kurrachee. Seedtime lasts from April to the 10th of June.

The summer is hot, but the lightness and the aridity of the air prevent its being unwholesome. During my visit the thermometer (F.) placed in a room with open windows showed at dawn 63—66°; at noon, 75°; and at sunset, 70°: the greatest midday heat was 105°. The mornings and evenings, cooled by breezes from the mountains, were deliciously soft and pure. The abundant electricity was proved, as in Sindh and Arabia, by frequent devils or dust-pillars, like huge columns of volcanic smoke, that careered over the miraged plains, violently excited where they touched the negative earth, and calm in the positive strata of the upper air, whence their floating particles were precipitated. Dust-storms and thunder-storms are frequent and severe. Clouds often gather upon the peaks, and a heavy black nimbus rises behind the Wasach wall, setting off its brilliant sunlit side, but there is seldom rain. Showers are preceded, as in Eastern Africa, by puffs and gusts of cold air, and are expected in Great Salt Lake City when the clouds come from the west and southwest, opposite and over the "Black Rock;" otherwise they will cling to the hills. Even in the hottest weather, a cold continuous wind, as from the nozzle of a forge-bellows, pours down the deep damp