The Pioche weekly record. [volume] (Pioche, Nev.) 1877-1900, 1892-04-28
MiIDER WHITE as
A Gradual Modification Of Cold for tho
Next Nine Hundred Years.


A Gradual Modification Of Gold for tho
Next Nine Hundred Years.
Every now and then some weather
sage predicts extremely cold winters,
and another ventures to say that the
sun is gradually losing heat and in time
arctic cold will prevail over the globe.
Whatever may have been the changes
during the vast cycles of time prior to the
advent of man, or whatever may be the
changes in the time to come, one thing
is quite certain, says Joseph Wallace In
Popular Science News, that our climate
has been much modified within the last
two thousand or three thousand years
"There have been fifteen climatic
changes since the beginning Of the gla-
cial age, each change lasting ten thou
sand five hundred years, and each
change reversing the seasons in the two
hemisphcres, the pole which had en-
joyed perpetual summer being doomed
to undergo perpetual winter for ten
thousand five hundred years. and then
passing to its former state for an equal
term. The physical changes upon the
carth's surface during the last eighty
thousand years modified the changes OF
climate even in the arctic regions, so
that the intense cold of the former
epochs was much modified during the
latter cpochs."
Reckoning these climatic changes in
their order, we had entered the epoch
of more genial temperature about
fifteen hundred years ago; and il no
~ ,ct, x,l, tnly t,ln ~ n
the present epoch, we may reasonably
expect q gradual modification of our
winters for nine thousand years to
come. The change to intense cold from
perpetual summer during the greater
part of the glacial period is supposed
to have been caused by the high tenn
perature of the north pole Us compared
to that of the south pole, owing to the
distribution of land around the two,
the south having almost none. DIR.
Croll thinks it was caused by the vary
ing inclination of the earth's axis,
which produced the relative position OF
the two poles toward the sun to be
periodically reversed at distant periods.
DIR. James Gciliie agrees with Croll on
the reverse of seasons every fifteen
hundred years during certain periods
of high ellipticity OF earth's orbit. But
it may be asked slow could the
fauna and flora propagate themselves
under such conditions?" The flora
itself at the quaternary age was OF ex-
treme visor. We know this from the
little which is left us, but more especial
ly from the presence of large number
of herbivorous animals-stags, horses,
elephants, rhinoceri, etc.-which ami
mated the plains and valleys of Europe
and America at that time. Evidently
they could not have lived and propa-
vegetation for nourishment and devel-
opment.
That which has deceived the adj
herents of the glacial theory, as under
stood in its absolute sense, is, they have
generally placed too high estimate on
its extent and intensity. 1t needs but u
little effort of the reasoning powers to
come to the conclusion that the earth
had cooled to the degree that all animal
and vegetable life should exist upon it,
and that a portion of the earth's sur
face permanently covered with snow
and ice was absolutely Indispensable to
the existence, perpetuity and well-be-
ing of animal and vegetable life. There
is everything to show a modification of
climate in our own days. If tits goes
on in the future as in the past there
viii be q marked difference in the tenn
perature two hundred or three hundred
years fiom now. Even degree in one
thousand years would effect grca,
change in the course of time. The low
ering of four degrees established the
6 ancient extension of glaciers, though il
did not interrupt animnl or vegetable
=. life. Fifty-four of the lifty-seven species
of mollusca have outlivcd the glacia
age, and all our savage animals-cver
a certain number which have disap
peared-dnte equally from the quater
nary. and were contemporary with thu
great extension of the glaciers.