GEOLOGY. 33 



v^ery cold- That fact being admitted, two questions naturally- 

 present themselves, to the mind: — Have these plants changed 

 their nature? Or, has our climate become colder, than it was 

 formerly? Tropical plants, that are annuals, without changing 

 their nature essentially, have been carried farther and farther 

 north, until they have become naturalized, to a northern cli- 

 mate. This remark applies, perhaps, to the palma-christi, 

 and several other annuals- But, the bamboo, date, cocoa-nut 

 bearing palm &c. found at Zanesville, are not annuals. Has 

 our climate become colder ? Some countries have become 

 warmer, than they once were. We suspect, indeed, we know 

 from the writers of the Augustan age, that Italy, France, Ger- 

 many and Britain, have become warmer, than they were, eigh- 

 teen hundred years since. Horace, in the days of Augustus, 

 introduces, us to Soracte, a mountain near Rome, covered 

 with snow, and gives us a picture of winter, and here that 

 picture is. 



" Vides, ut alta stet nive candidum, 

 " Soracte ; nee jam sustineant onus 

 •' Silvae laboiantes ; geluque, 

 "Flumina, constiterint acuto? 

 " Dissolve frigue, ligna super foco, 

 " Large reponens." 



What a picture of the winter at Rome, in the days of Augus- 

 tus ! It would now best suit the meridian of Quebec. Who 

 now sees such snows breaking down the trees, unable to sus- 

 tain their load, at Rome? Who now sees the Tiber one solid 

 bed of ice, so that its current is congealed by frost ? Who 

 now, in the Eternal city, needs such large piles of wood on 

 the hearth in winter ? 



Are the snows along the Ister five ells in depth? Virgil tells 

 us they were so deep, in his time : That the largest deer, 

 could hardly push the snow aside with their breasts, so that 

 their horns, scarcely showed themselves above the snow's, sur- 

 face. What a horrid picture does he give us, of the winters, 

 where Vienna now raises its imperial spires? The people 

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