Tea VERS. — On the former War mill in high Northern Latitudes. 469 



and water. It is certainly true that the Gulf Stream at present exercises a 

 considerable influence on the climate of the localities on which it impinges, 

 but this influence does not produce, outside of tropical regions, such effects 

 as those which would be necessary in order to account for the existence in 

 arctic regions of plant forms of the classes above alluded to ; and it is 

 scarcely possible to conceive any distribution of land and water which could 

 result in such effects, in the past, upon the climate of a part of the globe, the 

 present climatal conditions of which are admittedly almost opposed to the 

 existence of any vegetation whatsoever. But if we find that the polar 

 regions were those which were first fitted for the retention of water, we 

 may fakly assume that it is in those regions that we must search for the 

 first mdications of life on our globe, the temperature of those portions 

 which lie between the tropics, and for several degrees on each side of them, 

 being necessarily maintained for a much longer period at a heat too great 

 to permit water to lie upon the surface. It is curious in this connection 

 to observe that Sir Charles has given us maps (now shown to involve 

 serious fallacies) showing the relative distribution of land and water 

 which would be calculated to produce, in the present day, at all events, 

 the maximum of heat and cold on the surface of the globe, that which 

 apphes to the former showing the bulk of land lying for about 46° on 

 each side of the equator, and that which ajDplies to the latter showing the 

 bulk of the land extending for a similar distance from each of the poles. 

 On the whole, therefore, I feel that there is some justification for believing 

 that the climate of the arctic and antarctic regions of our globe during the 

 past geological epochs to which I have referred, was directly influenced by 

 heat radiated from it during its secular cooling from the condition of a 

 molten mass of aggregated cosmical matter, and that the first appearance 

 of life took place when portions of its surface became sufficiently cool to 

 admit of water resting upon it at a temperature not exceeding 120° Fahr. 



I do not apologize for bringing these views under your notice, as I agree 

 with Mr. Mattieu Williams that it is fortunate for the human race that men 

 who study pure science are so far raised by its moral influence above pre- 

 judice and personality, that their perception of truth is not obscured by the 

 medium through which it is conveyed, and that it is accepted as frankly, 

 fairly, and courteously from the humblest outside student as though pre- 

 sented by the highest constituted authorities. If the views contained in this 

 paper have no soundness in them they will be calmly refuted, or suffer 

 death from deserved neglect. If, on the other hand, they are at all sound 

 or suggestive, they will receive acceptance even from those whose pre- 

 conceptions may have been opposed to them. 



