The Madison daily leader. [volume] (Madison, S.D.) 1890-current, 1897-03-22
CLIMATIC EXTREMES.
PARTS OF THE COUNTRY WITH ONE
REGULARITY OR ANOTHER.
The Has the Greatest Range
of remperature-Death Valley the Hot
tes. Place-Where 1t Rains Every Day.

made memory notes OF SuCn climatic
pcculiaritics as have come under my OBJ
| scrvatiOn.
The place having the widest range of
temperature Of n with which l am
familiar is Fort Keogh, in the Yellow
tone valley. Not ~infrequently III the
winter the mercury tumblcs down to 80
known in summer to climb up to 100
degrees above. Here is an extreme range
of 10 degrees, and yet people manage
to live very comfortably there the year
round. In the early summer the grass
on the plains and hills turns brown and
yellow, and all green vanishcs from the
wide landscape except where a fringe
Of cottonwood trees skirts u water course.
1t is a popularity of the extreme high
temperature in the arid regions that you
do not pcrspire at all-that is, you do
not sensibly perspirc. The moisture is
all evaporated from your skin as fast as
it is formed by the extreme dryness Of
the air. The heat is not nearly SO op-
prcssive, however, as it is at a tempera-
ture of so or 90 degrees along the AT
lantic seaboard. If you are indoors or
under the shade of q tree, you are quite
comfortable.
Anything that will break the fierce
rays Of the sun is sufficient to relieve
you from all oppression from the high
temperature. Travelling some years ago
acros the hot, billowy plain of the great
basin Of the Columbia with a camping
party looking up a route for a railroad,
we came to q huge COlumnar rock of
black basalt. The day was intensely hot.
We stopped the teams, and, throwing
ourselves down on the shady side of the
rock, we recalled the phrase in the Bible
about 1.-THE shadow Of Il great rock in a
weary land and realized that q little
shade mean as much to the people Of
arid Palestine as to US tired travellers i'll
arid America.
The hottest place in the United States
is unquestionably Death valley, in
southern California. 1t is about 200 feet
below the sea level and is trimmed
around with black. bare mountains.
Birds flying across this valley in the
heated season often drop dead. BOrax
is found here, but the mining processes
cease in the heat of midsummer. l read
somewhere of a party of men who en-
tered the valley in July, knowing moth
ing Of the deadly heat, and who pre-
served their lives by lying all day in the
water of a little stream that came out Of
sI, NN,-,t -, n,>l ,,-,, .DI,, xJ-inl ~ -,
the fierce rays of the sun. They We're
glad to escape under the cooling shades
of night.
The rainiest place in the United States
is Neah bay, OF the strait Of Fuca, in
the state Of Washington. 1t actually
rains every day in the year, and the
total annual precipitation is nearly 100
inches. There is an Indian reservation
on tho bay. The natives have a very
pretty knack of making ornamental
basins and carving wooden bowls, which
they decorate with high colors.
The most remarkable climatic barrier
in the United States is that Of the Cas-
cade mountains, in Washington. In win
ter time the railway train tolls up the
eastern slope Of these mountains between
walls Of snow higher than the roofs of
the cars in Il long winding lane scOoped
out by the rotary pillow. Once through
the tunnel On the Northern Pacific, or
over the s~witchback on the Great North
crn, you suddenly leave winter behind
you, and, whirling down the western
slope Of the mountains, in less than an
hour you meet the full spring. The grass
is green, waterfowl swim On the river
and bays, the crows are holding their
annual conventions in the tree tops with
much Oratorical c~lanIor, and when you
arrive at Tacoma you find the t1OU; rs
blooming in the ~GCOryards. The change
seems magical and is as great as if you
should start from Chicago i'll January
and travel to the gulf of Mexico. yet the
whole distance you have traversed tc
bring about this wonderful transforma
ton is less than 100 miles.
The most peculiar climatic region
with which 1 am familiar is the Puge,
sound basin, in the state of Washington.
1t is separated from the ocean on the
west by the rugged snow g ad range OF
! the Olympic mountains, ailr its eastern
, boundary is the still loftier range of the
, Cascades. The sound is connected Will
the Pacific by the broad strait of Jual
de Fuca, and up this strait pours a grea'
volume of moist air, brought by thu
Japan current from far out to sea. Thu
mountains of Vancouver island III on
side and the Olympics on the other max
Of the strait an enormous funnel, n
|. the moisture laden winds are CONDENSED
against the cold, snowy ranges on cithe
hand and are precipitated in frequen
showers upon the shores of the sound
1t rarely SHOWS there, but it rains a lit
tie almost every day from October +
June. The result is to produce a dens
vegetable growth in the forest consisting
y of immense trees-firs, hemlocks, spruce
and cedars-and Of underground S
# dense that it is almost impossible t
force your way through it without har
re work with an AK. A st. Paul man {
y my acquaintance went out to that regio
y to see what he called his farm. He OWL
re a tract of land five or six miles frol