Report of the Naval committee to the House of representatives, August, 1850, in favor of the establishment of a line of mail steamships to the western coast of Africa, and thence via the Mediterranean to London; . ine of thirty-five degrees, in much the same manner that coasting is donein Canada. We arrived at the camp foot-sore and weary,and were glad enough to lie down and rest. Our determination showed that the height formerlygivtn for tlie mountain is too low. After making allow-ances for slight variations, the height of the mountain is18,200 feet. The barometer, at the summit, read
Report of the Naval committee to the House of representatives, August, 1850, in favor of the establishment of a line of mail steamships to the western coast of Africa, and thence via the Mediterranean to London; . ine of thirty-five degrees, in much the same manner that coasting is donein Canada. We arrived at the camp foot-sore and weary,and were glad enough to lie down and rest. Our determination showed that the height formerlygivtn for tlie mountain is too low. After making allow-ances for slight variations, the height of the mountain is18,200 feet. The barometer, at the summit, read , and the temperature was 35^ Fahr. During the as-cent of the second day, the barometer indicated a drop of .1inch. In 1796, Ferrer, by means of angle measurementstaken from the Encero, determined the height to be 17,879feet. Humboldt, a few years later, measured the mountainfrom a plain, near the town of Jalapa, and obtained 17,375feet. He observed, however, that his angles of elevationwere very small, and the base-line difficult to level. In1877, a Mexican scientific commission, composed of , Rodriguez, and Vigil, made the ascent of thevolcano from the side of San Andres, and determined the. ^ti^^aeg; ^-iteia SPECIES OF BIRDS. 81 height to be 17,664 feet. Dr. Kaska, not long since, de-termined, b}/ a mercurial thermometer, the height to be18,045 feet. Should our deductions prove correct, thenOrizaba, -and not Popocatepetl, must take the first placeamong the mountains of North America. The second nightwas passed like the first, in hugging the fire. Early on thefollowing morning we returned to San Andres, reachingthere late in the afternoon. The only life observed on thepeak was a Sparrow Hawk, a raven, an,d a few small leaving San Andres, a word concerning its avi-fauna may not be out of place. As before said, the differ-ence between the bfrds of San Andres and those of Orizaba,4,000 feet below, was marked. Only three species werecommon to both loc
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