to the North, by the gradual disappearance of the Eastern branch of the Andes, which sinks nearly to a level with the ocean, about the 216th parallel of North latitude, as if to make way for those mighty rivers by which Tēxăs, Louisiana, and the Flŏrīdăs are watered: but to the West, the Cordillera continues in an almost uninterrupted line, through Dŭrāngŏ and Sŏnōră, towards the frontiers of the United States, where it splits into various ramifications, until its course is lost in the unknown regions of the North.
Upon the whole of this Table-land, the effect of geographical position is neutralized by the extreme rarification of the air; while upon the Eastern and Western declivities it resumes its natural influence as it approaches the level of the sea, until the strip or belt of flat country which extends from the base of the Cordillera to the ocean, is subject to the same degree of heat as that which prevails in the East or West Indies, or any other country similarly exposed to the rays of a tropical sun.
Thus Mēxĭcŏ, Guănăjūātŏ, Zăcătēcăs, and the other great towns upon the central plateau, enjoy a temperature entirely different from that of Vĕrăcrūz, Tămpīco, Ăcăpūlcŏ and Săn Blās, which are situated nearly in the same parallels on the Eastern and Western coasts; while the intervening space is filled up with almost every possible modification of heat.
On the ascent from Vĕrăcrūz, climates (to use
