Mexico weekly ledger., 1895-02-07
ExTREMEsIN TEMPERATURE.
Cold Waves Unknown in Amy Country
but America This Winter Breaks
the Record.

Prof. H. A. HaZen, of Washington,
d. c., in a lengthy interview with al
Globe Democrat correspondenttell of
some remarkable phenomena in tent
p~erature in this country as follows:
Cold waves are very strange phe-
nomena and are unknown in Europe.
Nobody knows with certainty where
they come from or how they are
formed. They are formed somewhere
inland in the far northwest, in the
latitude of greatest cold, which, as you
know, is a good way south of the
North Pole. At the North Pole it is
probably comparatively warm, and
that extremity of the earth's axis is
perhaps surrounded bya an open and an
unfrozen sea. AS for the typical cold
wave, my belief is that it is composed
of air drawn down from the higher and
more frigid regions of the atmosphere.
| Ascend to an altitude of thirty miles
| above the earth's surface, and you
might find a rarefied air at a tempera-
ture of 100 degrees below zero, or even
much lower. The body of cold formed
by the downrush of this frigid air from
above starts on a journey eastward
across the continent, travelling at the
speed of a fast railway train, say, thir-
ty-five or forty miles an hour. As it
proceeds it spreads out. Obviously, the
cold air would be gradually warmed
during the trip unless the wave were
replenished with coldin some fashion.
| My notion is hat while the wave is in
transit fresh cold is continually drawn
into it from above, where there is al
ways an unlimited supply of air at an
extremely low temperature. Finally,
the a passes off owe the ocean. In
some manner the Allegheny Mountains
seem to interrupt the passage of cold
waves, to a certain extent, rs if the
cold air was banked up against that
range of hills, and its passage thus i'm
peded. On this account it is very diff
ficult to predict cold waves for the
region about Washington. | have
spoken of the extreme cold of the
higher layers of the atmosphere. The
temperature of outer space is very
low, of course-perhaps as low as 300
degrees below zero, Fahrenheit. Fit
were not for the atmosphere, which
serves as a blanket for the earth, we
should be exposed to this fearful cold,
and not all the fires that could be kept
burning would save us from being frog
en- stiff at short notice. The lowest
natural temperature ever recorded
was taken in a balloon at an altitude
of ten miles. 1t was 104 degrees be-
low zero. The balloon vas the Aero
phile, which assembled from Paris I'M
der the guidance of Gustave Hermite.
EXTREMES IN HEAT AND GOLD.
The lowest temperature eve re
corded on the earth was taken al
Werchojansk, in the interior of Siberia
January 10, 1885. 1t was 80 degree;
and a fraction below zero. Wercho-
iansk is in the latitude of the pole Of
cold. There the earth is frozen to 6
depth of about 100 feet, and in the
warmest season it never thaws. The
highest temperature recorded is ~
degrees and a fraction, taken at Alge-
ria, July II, 1879. The lowest temper
allure on record in the United States j;
81 dgrees below zero, at Tobacco Gar
den, North Dakota. Greedy, the are
tic explorer, has probably experienced
a wider range of temperature thar
any other living man. He recorded 81
degrees below zero at Fort Congor, il
tI.aAy- Franklin Rax.-Gn aaather~-se
casion, in the Maricopa Desert of Ari'
iona, his thermometer in the shade
ran up to ia above. A lucifer mattel
dropped upon the burning sands o
the Sahara will catch fire. 1t is yer,
difficult wen with the finest thermom
eters to get accurate records of ex
IRENE temperatures, and on that &C
count such observations in general ar
to be regarded as only approximate.
correct.