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Martinique Tropical Landscape, Martinique, 1887 Giclee Print Gauguin, Paul Buy at AllPosters.com Martinique (area: about 385 sq. mi.) is a rugged volcanic island formed on a platform of ancient crystalline rocks that have been covered by marine sediments and later overlaid with lava and other material from numerous volcanic centers. The mountains are generally steep, with knifeedge ridges and deep ravines. It is adjoined by a bank half a mile wide on the west and several miles wide on the east, where the shore line is markedly irregular. The island is evidently of composite origin; the rather large embayment on which Fort de France is situated apparently occupies a reëntrant between two maturely dissected volcanic masses; but the smaller bays which diversify the sides of this embayment are plainly due to the submergence of valleys of erosion. La Montagne Pelée at the north end of the island, famous for its terrific eruption in 1902, is a relatively young cone, not greatly changed from its constructional form by the incision of its numerous but narrow and shallow radial valleys. The geological structure of the island as a whole has been mapped and described by Giraud, and the description includes a chapter on its geological history, in which the sequence of eruptions by which the island mass has been built up, earlier in the south, later in the north, is fully treated; but nothing is said of its erosion and subsidence. The island may be divided into three physiographic regions, each dominated by a central massif. With their connecting ranges these form the backbone of the island. The southern region, culminating in the Massif de Vauclin ( 1657 feet), is the lowest of the three. The central region, although it does not contain the highest peak, is the most extensive elevated area. Its core, the Pitons de Carbet, is distinguished by four extremely steep, pinnacle-like mountains of which the highest rises to 3960 feet. The northern region is completely dominated by Mont Pelée (4428 feet), a steep volcanic cone with a huge base occupying the whole northern end of the island. There is little level land, except for the Plain of Lamentin extending along the Bay of Fort-de-France on the southwest side of the island and small patches between some of the ravines and in crescentic areas along the coasts. The small part of the island's coast seen by me, being selected for inspection, as it were, by the accidental time of a steamer's passage along it, may perhaps be taken as a fair sample of other parts of the southern coast. Its leading features, are simple enough. Maturely dissected mountainous masses, bearing no clear indication of their initial forms, rise in the interior; well opened valleys with smoothly graded side slopes descend to the coast; and the shore line continually varies from the small bays of partly submerged valley mouths to the steep headland cliffs of truncated spur ends. Although some of the several hundred feet above the shore line, they seem low in comparison with the summits that rise a thousand feet or more not far inland. The relation of the cliffs to the valley-mouth bays makes it clear that the cliff base lies below present sea level and that the cliffs were cut back either at normal ocean level before the island subsided to its present altitude or while the ocean was lowered beneath its present level during the Glacial epochs. The occurrence of the shallow banks on the east and west and of discontinuous coral reefs, especially on the eastern bank, makes it probable that the island was formerly, either in Preglacial or Interglacial times of normal ocean level, better reef-encircled than it is now. Under such conditions the headland cliffs could not have been cut, but they might well have been cut while the ocean was lowered in the Glacial epochs and the growth of protecting reefs was temporarily prevented. Confirmation of the view that the cutting of the cliffs was a temporary process is found in the fact that the cliffs are less mature than the valleys. Hence the valleys must have been eroded nearly to their present openness before the cliffs were cut; and the embayment of the valley mouths must result chiefly from island subsidence, not from Postglacial ocean rise. If the embayments occupied only narrow valleys incised by low-level erosion in the floors of mature valleys that had been previously eroded with respect to normal ocean level, ocean rise alone might explain their occurrence; but such is by no means the case. There is no appearance whatever of valley-invalley erosion; the erosion of the partly submerged valleys is clearly of one intention; hence the subsidence of the island probably took place either before or during the Glacial period, so that when the ocean was lowered in the Glacial epochs low-level erosion merely continued the work previously well advanced by normal erosion. Thus interpreted, Martinique is farther advanced than Dominica in the scheme of island development here outlined. The rivers are generally short, rushing torrents that roar down to the sea after mountain rains and eventually dwindle to mere trickles, some of which disappear altogether during the dry season. The eastward-flowing rivers (20 in number) have the more regular flow because they are on the windward side where there is more rainfall and where the vegetation helps to prevent an excessively rapid runoff. The westward-flowing rivers, however, are more important because they cross the drier part of the island. The southern two-thirds of the east coast and the entire coast line south of the Bay of Fort-de-France are low, irregular, and rocky or swampy (as along the Plain of Lamentin). Here the coastal waters are shallow. Wave-washed coral reefs and islets and, on the east, the trade winds make these shores dangerous to approach. Off the northwest and north coasts the water is very deep near shore. At the north end of the island there are great cliffs three hundred feet high separated by small, deeply cut valleys. CLIMATE Four seasons have been recognized in Martinique: January 15 to April 15, cool and dry; April 15 to July 15, warm and relatively dry; July 15 to October 15, hot and humid with storms and heavy rain; October 15 to January 15, rainy and cool. The island is ravaged by hurricanes about once in every ten years. Most of these occur in September, though occasionally they come in August, October, or late July. The insular situation keeps the temperature even. The easterly winds from over the Atlantic are fresh, cooling, and moisture-laden, but, during the dreaded calm spells in spring and summer and in places entirely cut off from breezes, the heat and humidity may become almost unbearable. The mean annual temperature at Fort-de-France is 79.2° F. The seasonal temperature range is very slight (4° to 5° F.), the diurnal range being much greater. The coolest month, January, averages 76.1° F. and the warmest month, May, 80.9° F., but the late summer and early fall months are much more unpleasant than May because of humidity and calm spells. There are clouds over Martinique most all the time with the possible exception of early morning. The relative humidity averages 80 per cent. February, March, April, and May have the least humidity with 76 to 78 per cent, while the fall of the year averages 82 to 83 per cent. In general, Martinique is rainy but has a dry season from January to July. November is the month of maximum rainfall. The mean annual rainfall for the wettest station, Deux Choux in the north-central part, is 220.09 inches, falling in approximately 285 rainy days. The driest station, Diamant, on the extreme southwestern coast, has 41.68 inches in approximately 125 rainy days. The two highest and wettest areas, around Mont Pelée and the Pitons de Carbet, receive more than 190 inches a year and are encircled by concentric belts of diminishing rainfall. The high year-round temperature, the rapid evaporation rate, and the porosity of the volcanic deposits, which allows a rapid penetration of the water, make the southern section semiarid to arid in spite of its 41-inch rainfall. Home