NORTH POLE OF THE WINDS 



the Pole and falls whenever it blows from the 

 south out of the interior of the continent. Over 

 the interior of Greenland it is intensely cold both 

 summer and winter, for those who crossed the 

 Greenland interior in the summer time found 

 temperatures far below the zero of the Fahren- 

 heit scale. 



Because of the vastness of the Greenland ice-cap 

 the air above it is constantly being cooled through 

 contact; and because the surface of the dome has 

 everywhere an outward slope, this cooled air slides 

 outward to replace warmer air upon the sides. This 

 motion is first slow but increases at a rapidly ac- 

 celerating rate, like that of all bodies which slide 

 on inclined planes under the influence of gravity. 

 It was Peary, the great Arctic Explorer and dis- 

 coverer of the North Pole, who first showed by 

 observation this outward movement of the air over 

 the Greenland ice-cap. Whenever he was going 

 up a slope the wind was found to be alwaj'^s in his 

 face, but on going down a slope it was found to 

 be at his back. Thus the flow of the air along the 

 surface of the ice resembles that of a liquid flowing 

 down the slope under the influence of gravity. 



But it is clear that air cannot continue to move 

 outward from a center in all directions unless air 

 flows into the central area to replace it, and, com- 



42 



