368 



THE ILLINOIS PAKMER. 



Dec. 



south to the very borders of the ArcticB. The gi- 

 gantic quadrupeds, the Mastedons, Elephants, 

 Tigers, Lions, Hyenas, Bears, whose remains are 

 found in Europe from its southern promontories 

 to the northernmost limit* of Siberia and Scandin- 

 avia, and in America from the Southern States to 

 Greenland and the Melleville Islands, may indeed 

 be said to have possessed the earth in those days. 

 But their reign was over. A sudden intense win- 

 ter, that was also to last for ages, fell upon our 

 globe ; it spread over the very countries where 

 these tropical animals had their homes, and so 

 suddenly did it come upon them that they were 

 embalmed beneath masses of snow and ice, with- 

 out even time for the decay which follows death. 

 The Elephant whose story was told at length in a 

 preceding article was by no means a solitary apici- 

 men ; up»n further investigation it was found that 

 the disinterment of these large tropical animals in 

 Northern Russia and Asia was no unusual occur- 

 rence. Indeed, their frequent discoveries of this 

 kind had given rise among the ignorant inhabit- 

 ants to the singular superstition already alluded 

 to, that gigantic moles lived under the earth, 

 which crumbled away and turned to dust as soon 

 as they came to the upper air. This tradition, no 

 doubt arose from the fact that when in digging 

 they came upon the bodies of these animals they 

 often found them perfectly preserved under the 

 frozen ground, but the moment they were exposed 

 to heat and light they decayed and fell to pieces 

 at once. 



Admiral Wrangel, whose Arctic explorations 

 have been so valuable to science, tells us that the 

 remains of these animals are heaped up in such 

 quantities in certain parts of Siberia that he and 

 his men climbed over ridges and mounds consist- 

 ing entirely of the bones of Elephants. Rhinocer- 

 osses, etc. From these facts it would seem that 

 they roamed over all these northern regions in 

 troops as large and numerous as the BufTalo herds 

 that wander over our western prairies now. "We 

 are indebted to Russian naturalists, and especially 

 to Ratlike, for the most minute investigations of 

 these remains, in which even the texture of the 

 hair, the skin and flesh has been subjected by him 

 to microscopic examination as accurate as if made 

 upon any living animal. 



We have as yet no clue to the source of this 

 great and sudden change of climate. Various 

 suggestioMS have bei-n made — among others that 

 formerly the inclination of the earth's axis was 

 greater, or that a submersion of the continents 

 under water might have produced a decided in- 

 crease of cold ; but none of these explanations are 

 satisfactory, and science has yet to find any cause 

 which accounts for all the phenomena connected 

 with it. 



It seems, however, unquestionable that since the 

 opening of the Tertiary age a cosmic summer and 

 winter have succeeded each other, during which a 

 Tropical heat and an Arctic cold have alternate- 

 ly prevailed over a great portion of the globe. In 

 the so-called diift (a superficial deposit subsequent 

 to the Tertiaries, of the origin of which I shall 

 Bpeak presently) there are found far to the south 

 of their present abode the remains of animals 

 whose home now is in the Arctics or the coldest 

 parts of the Temperate Zones. Among them are 

 the Musk-Ox, the Reindeer, the Walrus, the Seal, 

 and maay kinds of sheila characteristic of the ' 



Arctic regions. The northernmost part of Nor- 

 way and Sweeden is at this day the southern limit 

 of the Reindeer in Europe ; but their fossil re- 

 mains are found in large quantities in the drift 

 about the neighborhood of Paris, where their pres- 

 ence would, of course, indicate a climate similar to 

 the one now prevailing in Northern Scadanavia. 

 Side by side with the remains of the Reindeer are 

 found those of the European Marmot, whose pres- 

 ent home is in the mountains, about six thousand 

 feet above the level of the sea. The occurrence of 

 these animals in the superficial deposits of the 

 plains of Central Europe, one of which is now 

 confined to the high North, and the other to moun- 

 tain heights, certainly indicates an entire change 

 of climatic conditions since the time of their ex- 

 istence. European shells now confined to the 

 Northern Oceans are found as fossils in Italy, — 

 showing, that, while the present Arctic climate 

 prevailed in the Temperate Zone, that of the Tem- 

 perate Zane extended much farther south to the 

 region we now call sub-tropical. In America 

 there is abundant evidence of the same kinds 

 throughout the recent marine deposits of 

 the Temperate Zone, covering the low lands 

 above tide-water on this continent, are found fos- 

 sil shells whose present home is on the shores of 

 Greenland. It is not only in the Northern hemi- 

 sphere that these remains occur, but in Africa and 

 South America, wherever there has been an op- 

 portunity for investigation, the drift is found to 

 contain the traces of animals whose presence in- 

 dicates a climate many degrees colder than that 

 now prevailing there. 



But these organic remains are not the only evi- 

 dence of the geological winter. There are a num- 

 ber of phenomena indicating that during this pe- 

 riod two vast caps of ice stretched from the north- 

 ern polo southward, and from the southern pole 

 northward, extending in each case towards the 

 equator — and that icefields, such as now spread 

 over the Arctics, covered a great part of the Tem- 

 perate Zones, while the line of perpetual ice and 

 snow in the tropical mountain ranges descended 

 far below its present limits. 



Dairy Prospects of Northern Illinois. 



The present demand, the constantly increasing 

 inquiry for all dairy products, the high price of 

 butter and cheese, even for home consumption, 

 give indications that no more profitable business 

 can be followed than dairying. Chicago has in 

 the last decade so grown in size and numbers as to 

 bo out of all knowledge of men who have not been 

 there since they carted and sold the last load of 

 wheat from their own wagon at the ware house of 

 Chas. Walker, or some other sharp buyer. There 

 are a few such even in our county. It is hard tell- 

 ing the number of inhabitants or transient resi- 

 dents of the "Garden City." Well, all actual and 

 transient residents live by eating, and every one 

 will have (if they can get it) a nice plate of fresh 

 sweet butter. The Fox River valley used to fur- 

 nish a good deal of this staple, but like New York, 

 Chicago has her milk trains, and as it is much 

 more profitable to sell milk, even at two cents a 

 quart, than to make either butter or cheese, all the 

 milk produced on the farms near the railroad lines 

 goes to supply the breakfast-tables of the citizens 

 of Chicago. 



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