CLIMATE. 41 



below zero in Canada and New Brunswick ; and tliis life- 

 destroying cold continuing for days, perliaj).-^ weeks. Tlien see 

 another effect of tliis — the Canadians and other North Americans 

 of the same latitude are obliged to keep nj) liot stoves almost 

 continually in their houses, while we have open fireplaces, 

 or at most Franklins ; our children, I may say, are lightly 

 clad as in summer, spend a large portion of their time in the 

 open air ; and thus while onr neighbours have the sallow liue 

 of confinement tinging their clieeks, and their children look com- 

 paratively pale, our youngsters are blooming witli the losy luie 

 of health, developing their eneigies l)y air and exercise, and pre- 

 paring themselves for the battle of life hereafter, either as hardy 

 mariners or healthy matrons — tlie blooming mothers of a power- 

 ful race." "The mean temperature of 1859 was 44 ilegrees." 



Sir Steidien Hill, wlio was Governor of the island for six years, 

 says: "The climate of Newfoundlaml is exceedingly healthy, 

 The robust and liealtliy appearance of tlie people, and the ad- 

 vanced age to whicli many of them attain, testify to the purity 

 anil excellence of the air which they inhale aval the invigorating 

 (pialities of the breezes of British North America." 



Alexander Murray, C. M. G., Geological Surveyor, who spent 

 eighteen years in the island, traversing it in all directions, saj's : 

 "The climate of Newfoundland is, as compared with the neigh- 

 l)ouring continent, a moderately temperate one. The heat is far 

 less intense, on an average, during tlie summer, than in any jjart 

 of Canada, and the extreme cold of winter is muidi less severe. 

 The thermometer rarely indicates higher than seventy degrees 

 Fah., in the former, or much below zero in the latter ; although 

 the cold is occasionally aggravated by storms and the humidity 

 consequent on an insular position. The climate is undoubtedly 

 a very healthy one, and the general physi([ue of the natives, who 

 are a ]>owerfully-built, robust and hardy race, is a good example 

 of its intiuence." 



The climate of St. John's, it .-liould 1 e reiiiL-uiliered, is not 

 a fair standard by which to judge of the whole island. It is on 

 the most eastern pt)int in the peninsula of Avalon, and therefore 



