46 THE SNO W REGION. 



surface), the one, the northern hemisphere, the other, the 

 southern. * 



In their progress through these various climates, our two 

 travellers will arrive at a very curious comparative result, 

 that the southern hemisphere is colder than the northern. 

 This difference becomes especially recognisable below the 5oth 

 degree of south latitude ; so that, after passing the Antarctic 

 Circle, the ice opposes the voyager's course with nearly insur- 

 mountable obstacles ; while, in the northern hemisphere, the 

 whaler frequently penetrates to Spitzbergen, situated much 

 nearer to the Pole than to the Polar Circle. This is a general 

 fact ; we confine ourselves to putting it forward. 



Let us now suppose that our two travellers, always ready to 

 compare the results of their inquiries, accomplish the ascent 

 of a very lofty mountain situated under the Equator, such as 

 Chimborazo. In the course of their ascent, they will traverse 

 the same climates and the same zones which had marked the 

 stages of their journey from the Equator to the Poles : at their 

 starting-point they will find themselves in the Torrid zone, then 

 will come the Temperate and the Frigid zones, the latter 

 rendered inaccessible by glaciers and eternal snows. These 

 vertical zones of the mountain are characterised by vegetables 

 and animals whose types are found in the corresponding 

 horizontal zones of the terrestrial surface. But what is most 



* The two temperate zones together represent perceptibly the half, or 

 0.520, and the torrid zone, two-fifths, or, more exactly, 0.398, of the terres- 

 trial surface. 



