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CHAPTER XIII. WOODS AND FORESTS. T HE climate of Cyprus is extreme in temperature during the months of June, July, August, and until the close of September; throughout the greater portion of the island the treeless surface absorbs the sun's rays, and during the night radiates the heat thus obtained, which raises the thermometer to 900 before sunrise : while at noon it occasionally marks ioo° beneath the shade. A treeless country must either be extremely hot or cold, according to the latitude ; and without a certain proportion of forest there will be an absence of equilibrium in temperature. Most persons will have observed the effect of heat radiation from rocks, or even from the walls of a building that have been exposed to a summer's sun during the long day. A t about six P.M., when the air is cool, the sun-heat stored by absorption escapes from its imprisonment, and thermometers would exhibit a difference of many degrees if placed at two feet from the ground, and at fifty ; the rocks and earth have been heated like an oven. Trees will affect the surface of the soil in the same manner that an umbrella protects an individual from the sun, and upon lofty mountains they exercise a marked influence upon the rainfall. Should the summits be naked, the rocks

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