The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-07-13
HOW THE LAST MAN MAY DIE.
| Fates That May Overtake tho Survivor of
| tho Human Race.

From London Answers.
Astronomers tell us that the day
must come when the earth will, like the
moon, wheel through the heavens a
dead and barren ball of matter-air-
less, waterless, lifeless. But long,
long before that time man will be
extinct, will have disappeared so utter
ly that not so much as the bleached
skeleton of a human being will be Wis
ible on all the millions Of square miles
of the surface of this planet. Unless by
huge and universal cataclysm the whole
race is swept at once into eternity 1t
is but reasonable to suppose that man,
like any other race of animals, Will as
appear slowly and that eventually
there will be but a single human being
left--some old, old man, gray-headed
and bearded, and left to wander alone
in a solitude that may be imagined
but not described. How will he die,
this last relic of the teeming millions
that once transformed the face of the
globe and ruled undsputed master of
every other living thing? There are
many fates that may befall him. He
may go mad with the horror of loneli-
ness and himself end his own miserable
existence. He may be eaten by the
vast reptiles or giant insects winch VIII
then probably infest the solitudes. But
his fate may be far Weirder ana more
dreadful Scientists say that as we
so richly supplied with we let loose
into the atmosphere an ever increasing
volume of carbonic acid gas. Much OF
this is taken up by plants, but not all.
1t must increase and eventually poison
the breathable air, filing the valleys
and mounting slowly to the hilltopS,
where the last remains of animal life
are striving for existence. The last
man will climb higher and higher, but
eventually the suffocating, invisible
fluid will reach and drown him. -.
Again, it is said that the earth as 1t
gets older is cracking like dry mud.
These cracks will increase until at last
they will let the waters of the ocean
and rivers sink into the fiery centers
of the globe. Then will occur an ex-
plosion so terrible as may startle the
inhabitants of neighboring worlds. The
last man in this case will probably De
some arctic explorer or Eskimo, whom
the vast plains of ice around will save
from instant death and leave to grill
a few moments till the ice continents
are swallowed by redhot gases and
steam. Suppose these earth cracks de-
velop more slowly, they may suck away
the water without devastating ex-
blossoms. Then the last mans fate will
be the worst describable. He will die
of thirst The scene of his death will
probably be the great valley in the bed
of the Atlantic ocean, off the Brazlllan
coast half way between Hio Janelro
and the cape, where now six miles OF
green water lie between the steamer
keel and the abysmal slime beneath
There, hopelessly digging in the ever
driving mud, he must perish and leave
his bones to parch on waterless
planet The antarctic polar ice cap
has been growing thicker and heavier
for uncounted ages. The distance from
| the south pole to the edge OF this ice
| cap is 1,400 miles. The ice rises steadily
| from the edge TO the center. At that
| center it cannot be less than twelve
miles in thickness-twice as thick as
Mount Everest is high. Suppose 1T
| splits. Imagine the gigantic mass of
| water and ice that will come sweeping
| up north over the oceans and CONT
| nents of the earth. Where, then, will
| the last man breathe his final gasp?
| High up in the SHOWS of some great
| range he will perish miserably of cold
| and starvation, looking down on a huge
| shallow sea beneath whose tossing
waters will lie the whole of the races of
| the world. Or, last, and perhaps drear-
| lest fate of all, the human race may
| outlive other mammals and last until
! the sun, as some day 1t must, grows
| dull and cold, and vegetation dies from
| the chilled earth. The miserable rem
nant of earths people must then slowly
| die out after ages of existence to which
| that of the Eskimo of to-day is para