508 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. 



by the roving pirates of the Baltic to that island upon its discovery in the ninth 

 century, it may certainly be concluded that the climate of the north was then analogous 

 to what it is at present. 



A different opinion, that the climate of the midland part of the temperate zone, espe 

 cially in Europe, is less rigorous now than it was sixteen or seventeen centuries ago, 

 appears to be supported by sufficient evidence. After making allowance for inaccuracy 

 and exaggeration in the statements of the classical writers, they will still be found 

 descriptive of a cold in various districts, as a feature of the ordinary temperature, which 

 is not realised at present. The epistles written by Ovid from Pontus, whither he was 

 banished by order of Augustus, describe the rigour of the climate there, in terms which 

 would suit the winter of Hudson's Bay. He mentions, among other instances of the 

 extreme cold, the Euxine Sea being frozen over, so as to bear men and cattle upon it. 

 Tertullian, one of the Christian fathers in the second century, writing in the style of the 

 fierce zealot and florid rhetorician, against the heretic Marcion, thus refers to the same 

 region: " That tract, which is called the Pontus Euxinus, the hospitable sea, has been 

 refused all favours, and is mocked by its very name. The day is never open, the sun 

 never shines willingly, there is but one atmosphere fog ; the whole year is wintry ; every 

 wind that blows comes from the north ; liquors are only such before the fire ; the rivers 

 are blocked up with ice, the mountains are heaped higher with snow ; all things 

 are benumbed, all things are stiff with cold, nothing but cruelty has there the 

 warmth of life ; that kind of cruelty, I mean, which has supplied the stage with fables 

 concerning the sacrifices of the Tauri, and the loves of Colchis, and the tortures of Cau 

 casus. But there is nothing so barbarous and miserable in Pontus, as that it has given 

 birth to Marcion ; he is more savage than a Scythian, more unstable than the wild 

 inhabitant of a waggon, more inhuman than the Massageta, more audacious than the 

 Amazon, darker than the mist, colder than the winter, more brittle than the ice, more 

 treacherous than the Danube, more precipitous than Caucasus." Virgil refers to the 

 winter on the banks of the Ister of the Greeks, the modern Danube, in the third Georgic, 

 in a manner which at present is inapplicable to any part of its course: 



" The sun from far peeps with a sickly face, 

 Too weak, the clouds and mighty fogs to chase, 

 When up the skies he shoots his rosy head, 

 Or in the ruddy ocean seeks his bed. 

 Swift rivers are with sudden ice constrain'd, 

 And studded wheels are on its back sustain'd ; 

 A hostry now for waggons, which before 

 Tall ships of burden on its bosom bore. 

 The brazen cauldrons with the frost are flaw'd ; 

 The garment, stiff with ice, at hearths is thaw'd. 

 With axes first they cleave the wine ; and thence 

 By weight, the solid portions they dispense. 

 From locks uncomb'd, and from the frozen beard, 

 Long icicles depend, and crackling sounds are heard. 

 Meantime perpetual sleet, and driving snow, 

 Obscure the skies, and hang on herds below. 

 The starving cattle perish in their stalls ; 

 Huge oxen stand enclos'd in wintry walls 

 Of snow congeal'd ; whole herds are buried there 

 Of mighty stags, and scarce their horns appear. 

 The dexterous huntsman wounds not these afar 

 With shafts or darts, or makes a distant war 

 With dogs, or pitches toils to stop their flight, 

 But close engages in unequal fight ; 



