8 Kansas Academy of Science. 



believed in; imagination is rich and varied, but not wild and sensual; patient and ex- 

 tended research mark the labors of the plodding brain-workers of Western Europe. 



In America the influences of climate are plain to all. Of one race, the settlers of 

 Jamestown and Plymouth began their work ; but if the New Englanders had to contend 

 with greater privations and a colder climate, they were repaid for it by largely giving 

 thought to the nation. New England principles and ideas are not mere expressions — 

 they are freighted with meaning. Are the incompatible characteristics of the two sections 

 of our country traceable so much to anything else as to influences of climate? Slavery- 

 was once in Massachusetts as well as in South Carolina. The climate and productions; 

 the sense of right, born of a vigorous conscience and healthy brain ; the predominance of 

 reason and intellect over the imagination and pa.=5sions, as Guyot explains — all, no doubt, 

 had to do with this difference. In the North, man's character and activities, under the 

 grayer skies and severer climate, are more in his control; while the fiery Southron ia 

 impatient at the Northerner's slowness. But American literature, as such, has almost 

 all grown up north of 55° Fah., which is near Mason and Dixon's Line. Edwards, 

 Webster, Bancroft, Prescott, Motley, Irving, Emerson, Hawthorne, Whittier, Longfellow — 

 names to live as long as America lives — are all Northern men, and have few compeers 

 in the warmer, enervating Southern States. 



After these reviews, the question naturally arises, What of Kansas ? Will her climate 

 probably be productive of brain creations or not? The mean temperature at Lawrence, 

 for eight years, has been 52.82° Fah. Somewhat warmer than New England and Scot- 

 land, those centers of mental activity; the former being at Boston 47, and at Edinburgh 

 46 ° Fah. It is almost exactly the temperature of Berlin, the center of German activity, 

 and of London, the center of English activity. The extreme heat of the summer is 

 almost continually relieved by breezes, but for which vigorous mental and physical 

 activity would be at times almost totally cut oflT. As it is, more or less enervation is felt 

 by people from a cooler climate. It is feared by many that this is leading to habits of 

 indolence, especially in the influence of three or four summer months. Yet to say, in 

 face of the vast crops and general improvements, both private and public, that the people 

 of Kansas are much given to indolence, would be folly. It may be feared, however, that 

 keenness of mental energy is somewhat dulled by the heat. To be productive in brain- 

 work, not only is keen energy demanded, but impassionate patience. The production 

 of a single book has often cost long years of continuous work. Will Kansas climate 

 invite to such patient plodding ? 



Possibly another cause for fear is the ease with which simply a living is gained. Not 

 nearly as much toil, care and economy are called for here to gain a living as in New 

 England. History shows that when a people can easily get a competency, or wallow in 

 wealth, degeneracy of mind follows. Note the commencement of degeneracy in Egypt, 

 Persia and Eome. No age in English literature has equaled that of Elizabeth. Yet 

 Englishmen had to work much harder then than now. Will lack of necessity for hard 

 toil be a bar to mental creation in our State? Thinking of these things, I have wished 

 that some superfluous spurs from the Rocky Mountains were set down in the middle of 

 Kansas. When we think of the hectic literature growing up among the foot-hills of the 

 Himalayas, the Ghauts and the Zendavesta in the eastern highlands of Persia, the He- 

 brew scripture m the hill-country of Palestine, of Greek and Latin classics among the 

 mountains of Greece and the Apennines, the literature of France, Great Britain and 

 Germany, in countries, many parts of which are broken with high hills and rugged 

 mountains, of New England, New York and Ohio, all of tliem hilly and mountainous, 

 we can sigh for the subtle something hanging above these mountains — the bracing air, 

 the intoxication of their fresh breezes, or varied scenery, that some way has given birth, 

 has shaped and vivified the best brain and heart productions for four thousand years. 



