The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1885-12-24
N 4 osetinx OolAse..

That tho climate Of moro than one
region near or within tho Arctic circle
is growing more and more inhospita-
BILE, 10 indicated by several circumstan-
ces. For several years past there has
been . considerable immigration Of the
people Of Iceland into that part of
North America which lies just north of
Minnesota. II the winters of that n.y.
perborean section are more merciful
than those of their own country, it can
be no cause for wonder that the people
Of Iceland are so eager to quit their ma
tive land. For thousand years their
ancestors had lived on that lonely
northern isle, and got along comforts
bly,, so far as Is known; bit the in
creasing rigors of the climate for the
last twenty or thirty years appear to
have disheartened even the native Ice
landers, DR.. Kane speaks of similar
state of things existing among the Es-
quimaux along the shores of Baffins
bay and Smiths sound; he says those
poor people are rapidly and surely dy-
ing out, and will soon be exterminated.
Once there were thousands where there
are now but few scores. The same
thing seems to be killing of, or driving
of, the people of the Labrador coast.
These poor fishermen, whose huts are
perched among the rocks on the DESC
late northern shore of the Gulf of St.
Lawrence, have suffered a series of
>,ooxc ~ famine Euorxy fo,.
some years past, the report has come
that they were dying of starvation.
Their fisheries have failed. On these
they have relied for subsistence. since
the cold and rocky shore, with its sum-
mer frosts, affords no chance for farms
and gardens. The fish (mostly cod
and mackereD seem to have been
driven out of that part of the gulf by
the increasing GOODNESS of the water;
at all events they have disappeared,
and the fisheries have failed
miserably this year. People
are obliged to beg for a living of
the few who have the means 10 give.
A government steamer left Quebec last
Saturday, loaded with fuel and -four to
alleviate the sufferiAgs of the poor fish
ermen and their families on the Lab
radOr coast. 1t is fearful region
as gloomy and forbidding as the shores
of Greenland, though in summer with
| out their snow. In Greenland itself
the climate is known to be far more Sc
we're than it was when the Mortimer
discovered and named that country
for verdure and its vines. That. to be
sure, was in the south part of that vast
| ip1onA. hut avov, fhoxo oil noun ic doc
olation. As to the poor people of Lab
rador, a Quebec dispatch says:
"Their supply of flour has been en-
tirely exhausted, and, to add to their
sufferings and privations, scurvy has
made its appearance, and many have
died of it. The sufferings of the wom-
en- and children beggar description.
Little ones are dying in the arms of
their mothers, who have no nourish-
ment to give them.''
New England lies far enough to the
north for winter habitation. The an
gle %! degrees, which is called ''thc
obliquity of the ecliptic,'' gives us
about all the winter we want-and a
little more than is always agreeable
After the sun has left our northern
hemisphere, it is pleasanter to think
of isles and shores that he still will
brighten and warm, even when these
northern lands are dark in shadow and
buried in snow, or shivering in polar
blasts. The climatic changes we
have referred to do not seem to be lin
tied to the far northern regions; they
affect the more temperate parts of the
globe. It is known that the climate of
ancient Greece was much more salubri-
Gus $500 years ago than it is now; and
the same thing seems to be true of
many other countries. Is the planet
slowly entering upon another of its
long cold cycles?