Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-06-17
THE LAST MORTAL,
Speculation as to the Fate That Will
Finally Overtake Him.

Finally Overtake Him.
From Answers.
Astronomers tell US that the day must
come when the earth will like the moon
wheel through the heavens a dead and bar
rem ball of matter-airless, waterless, life.
less. But long, long before that time l. an
will be extinct, will have disappeared Sc
utterly that not 80 much as the bleached
skeleton of human being will be visible
on all the millions of square miles of the
surface of this planet.
Unless by some huge and universal cata-
clysm the whole race is swept at once into
eternity, it is but reasonable to suppose
that man, like any other race of ANIMALS
viii disappear slowly, and that eventually
there will be but single human being left
some old, old man, gray-headed and
bearded and left to wander alone in a soil
tude that may be imagined but not de-
scribed.
How will he die, this last relic of the
teeming millions that once transformed the
face of the globe and ruled undisputed mas
tiers Of every other ilving thing? Tnere are
many fates that may befall him. He may
go mad with the horror of loneliness and
nlmSeiT end his own miserable existence.
He may be eaten by the vast reptiles or
giant insects which will then probably in
fest the SolitudeS.
But his fate may be far weirder and more
dreadful. Scientists say that, as we burn
the coal and timber we are still so richly
supplied with, we let loose into the atmos-
phere an ever increasing volume of car
bonic acid gas. Much of this is taken up
by plants. but not all. 1t must increase and
eventually poison the breathable air filling
the valleys and mounting slowly to the hill
tops, where the last remains of animal life
are are, striving for existence. The last man
will climb higher and higher, but even
tually the Sutfocating invisible flood will
reach and drown him.
Again, it is said tnat the earth as it gets
nj is,
cracks will increase until at last they will
let the waters of the ocean and rivers sink
INTO the fiery center Of the globe. Then
Will occur an explosion so terrible as NAV
startle the inhabitants of neighboring
worlds. The last man in this case will
probably be some Arctic explorer or Eski-
mo, whom the vast plains of ice around
Will save from instant death and leave to
grill few moments till the ice continents
are swallowed ny redhot gases and steam.
suppose these earth cracks develop more
slowly they may suck away the water with
out devastating explosions. Then the last
man ma ;, Iale VIII pc 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 Bra
ziiian coast, halfway between Rio Janeiro
water lie between the Steamers keel and
the abyssmal slime beneath. There. hope
lessly digging in the eter-drying mud he
must perish and leave his bones to parch
on Waterless planet.
The Antarctic polar ice cap has been
growing thicker and hearier for amounted
ages The distance from the south pole to
the edge of this ice cap1is 1,400 miles. The
ice rises steadily from the edge to the CEN
ter. AT that center it cannot be less than
twelve miles in thfckness-twice as thick
as Mount Everett is high Suppose it
splits Imagine the gigantic mass of water
and ICE that Will come sweeping up north
over oyer the oceans and continents of the earth.
mere, then. will the last man breathe his
hnal gasp? High UP intthe SHOWS of some
great range he VIII perish miserabIy of
coio and starvation hooking down on a
huge shallow sea beneath whose tossing
waters VIII lie the whsle of the races of the
or last, and perhaps dreariest fate of all
the human race may soutlive other mann
ihais and last until the sun, as some day
IL II, must, grow dull and cold, and vegetation
ules from the chilled earth. The miserable
remnant of earth's people must Then sIouyi',
uie OUT after ages of an existence to which
that of the Eskimo Of today is a paradise