Perth Amboy evening news., 1923-05-28

WASHINGTON, May 27-Predic-
tions by scientists that we are like
ly to have a cold and freakish sum-
mer, which will be bad for crops
and the ice business, bring home TO
us once more the uncertain n I'M
movable character Of the celestial
heating plant upon which life on
this terrestrial globe depends.
We are apt to think of the sun
as something extremely dependable.
AS a matter Of fact it Is like a big
bonfire which Is slowly but surely
burning out, which cannot be re-
plenished, and which does not burn
at all evenly.
Just at present 1t seems a little
balky. like a furnace fired by an
amateur. While the Middle West
recently was blanketed by a heavy
May snowstorm, places in Califor-
| mia sWeltered in oyer a hundred de-
grees of heat, and trains have been
crowded with people taking prema-
ture summer vacations to escape IL.
Crops in some parts of the United
States have been burnel up by the
blazing sun, and in other, grain has
been retarded and fruit killed by
unaecountable cold snaps.
Meantime, DIR. c. G. Abbott of the
Smithsonian Institution, has made
the surprising discovery that the
temperature of the earth has fallen
off in the last few months three or
four per. cent. For SINE reason 1t
has not been absorbing its usual
amount of heat.
The word usual in this connec-
ton a be safely used only as re-
ferring to comparatively short peri
! aAg - time IL Won faEa a ling view
of the case, there seems 10 be moth
ing usual about the temperature Of
the earth. 1t varies upaccountably.
Time was when the present site of
New York City was covered by an
Arctic ice cap, and there was an
other time when the present coal
fields OF Pennsylvania were covered
by vast semi-tropical Jungles OF
giant ferns among which tWo-ton
dinosaurs splashed and frolicked.
The climate of this country, as we
know it, is a comparatively recent
development, and it is certainly a
temporary thing.
1t is a good thing for the soul to
remember that, as far as scientists
can determine, the sun must ineyi'
tably burn out and leave us all in
the dark. That viii be some billions
of years hence. Even so, it makes
the price of sugar and the nonstop
dancing record geem less important
TO realize that the whole human race
is an accidental and temporary thing,
like green scum on a wet stone. Our
little stone is going TO get colder and
colder, in all probability, and the
area of it which man can inhabit will
steadily decrease. Probably civil
cation will fight valiantly against
conditions becoming ever more rig
orous, and will finally perish. Man
perhaps, will revert to savagery and
then take the backward path of evo-
luton still farther, grow a coat OF
fur and become a huge Arctic an
thropold ape, living in holes in the
Ice. Finally he will perish, with al
other life, and the earth will q
spinning through space like a COLI
lender pitcned into the ash can.
Year without a Summer
All that is a long way in the fu'
lture, but climatic changes which viii
affect every one of us may be jus
ahead. AT least the scientists, Will
most OF them refuse TO commi
themselves, admit the possibility o
remembered that the year 1871
d. hAOMll do NiN yNal NSAAAbAN
summer" and the weather men ar
looking up it's records to see if the,
shed any light on the present situa
ton.
Most of them seem to blame III
situation on the sun spots. Thes
: huge spots which move across tn
disk OF the sun in regular rotation
, have beeen puzzling scientists eve
since Calico. They have been ger
: orally believed, but never proved t
= have a definite effect upon the wea
j Their. Once they were believed to b
huge masses OF Stag floating in tn
sea of molten metal which the su
was supposed to be. Now the Su
D is regarded al a mass of solid an
a gaseous matter all mixed up, an
. the sun spots are described q
vast disturbance in the field
: electro magnetic force that sul
G rounds the sun"
1t would seem that they can be
" be likened, for the edifhcation Of I'll
iayman. to huge whiri-pools in
a mass OF hot gas, which draws dow
= to the u colder gases from a dii
Y lance, so forming a cloud before i
az II appears to US. II Is Easy
Imagine that such clouds might CT
~Sr~@~AA~a and soEsd4ce the ten