Stronghand by Gustave Aimard

All southern nations are fond of shade, flowers, and birds; and as the heat of the climate compels them, so to speak, to live in the open air, they have arranged their gardens with a degree of comfort unknown among us. The Italians and Spaniards, whose houses, during the greater part of the year, are only inhabitable for a few hours a day, have striven to make their gardens veritable oases, where they can breathe the fresh evening air without being annoyed by those myriads of mosquitoes and gnats unknown in temperate climates, but which in tropical latitudes are a real plague. At midday they may be seen wheeling in countless myriads in every sunbeam.

The Hispano-Americans especially have raised the gardening art to a science, being always engaged in trying to solve the problem of procuring fresh air during the hottest hours of the day -- that is to say, between midday and three p.m., during which time the earth, which has been heated since dawn by the burning heat of a torrid sun, exhales deadly effluvia, and so decomposes the air that it is impossible to breathe it.