382 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



between 44 and 45 of north latitude 

 nearly the same as are the White Mountains 

 and the Adirondacks is 65 by 55 miles in 

 area, and comprises 3,575 square miles. 



Every portion of this area is more than 

 6,000 feet above the level of the ocean, or 

 nearly as high as the summit of Mount 

 Washington. In it is a beautiful sheet of 

 water, the Yellowstone Lake, 330 square 

 miles in area, and 7,42*7 feet above the sea. 

 Tremendous gorges, chasms, canons, water- 

 falls, and forest, make this whole tract sur- 

 passingly wild. It is walled on every side 

 by mountain-ridges, from 10,000 to 12,000 

 feet high. On these elevated summits lie 

 perpetual snows, which feed three of the 

 largest rivers in North America. 



The sources of the Yellowstone and Mis- 

 souri, which empty into the Mississippi, and 

 thence into the Gulf of Mexico of the 

 Snake River, which flows westward to the 

 Columbia and the Pacific of the Green 

 River, which discharges its waters through 

 the Colorado into the Gulf of California are 

 among these mountains. 



This whole region was in recent time 

 volcanic. The mountains are of volcanic 

 origin. A vast number of hot springs, mud- 

 volcanoes and geysers of a temperature 

 from 100 to 195 Fahrenheit, indicate the 

 close proximity of the unextinguished fires. 



On account of its great elevation, frost 

 forms every month in the year. In summer 

 the thermometer falls to 26, but the air is 

 clear and invigorating. The reservation of 

 this wild and magnificent tract, so abound- 

 ing in the most wonderful phenomena of 

 Nature, was a wise foresight, and a tribute 

 to Science in the highest degree honorable 

 to our government. 



At a recent dinner of the London Acad- 

 emy of Art, Prof. Tyndall thus happily ex- 

 pressed himself touching the relations of 

 art and science : " There is no reason why 

 art and science should not dwell together in 

 amity ; for, though they are both suitors of 

 the same mistress, Nature, they are so in a 

 sense and fashion which preclude the thought 

 of jealousy on either side. You love her for 

 her beauty, we for her order and her truth ; 

 but I trust that neither of us is so narrow- 

 hearted as to entirely exclude from himself 

 the feelings which belong to the other. In- 



deed, each is necessary to the completion of 

 the other. The dry light of the intellect, the 

 warm glow of the emotions, the refined ex- 

 altation of the aesthetic faculty, are all part 

 and parcel of human nature ; and to be 

 complete we must be capable of enjoying 

 them all. Trust me that we, whose light on 

 earth is for the most part that dry light to 

 which I have referred, often seek, and some- 

 times have, ' glimpses that make us less 

 forlorn ' of those aspects of Nature which 

 reveal themselves in all their fulness to the 

 eyes of art. We need such glimpses as a 

 compensation for much that the times have 

 taken away from us. There are some of us 

 workers in science who largely share the 

 poet's yearning to ' hear old Triton blow 

 his wreathed horn,' and who, nevertheless, 

 in opposition to natural bias, have been 

 compelled to give up, not only Triton, but 

 many later forms of the power which for a 

 time assumed his shape. Emptied of the 

 hopes and pleasures flowing from such con- 

 ceptions, we stand in more special need of 

 all that Nature has to offer in the way of 

 grandeur and beauty, of all that history has 

 to offer in the way of strength and inspira- 

 tion, and of such interpretations, by men of 

 genius, of Nature, history, and contempo- 

 rary life, as at this moment adorn these 

 walls. If I might employ, in a sense so 

 qualified as to render me sincere in using 

 it, a form of language familiar to you all, I 

 would say that we interpret these works of 

 genius, these achievements in which our 

 best men embody their highest efforts, as 

 the outcome of the cultivated, but at the 

 same time inborn and unpurchasable gift 

 of God. For, though the laborer be worthy 

 of his hire, and though the leaders both in 

 arts and science may now by good right 

 make pleasant terms with the world, they 

 reached the position which enables them to 

 do this through periods of labor and reso- 

 lute self-denial, during which their arts and 

 their science were to them all in all ; and 

 reward was the necessary incident and not 

 the motive power of their lives." 



Mr. James Geikie, in a fourth paper on 

 " Changes of Climate during the Glacial 

 Epoch," thus states his views as to the se- 

 quence of climates in England during this 

 time : Fir3t, a succession of alternate gla- 



