104 TWENTIETH ANNUAL REPORT ON THE STATE CABINET. 



US, the storms come to us from that direction, and fall with west- 

 erly winds ; and observation shows that our average amount is 

 scarcely less than that which falls on the sea coast. 



The influence of our climatic peculiarities upon man and upon 

 civilization, is an important topic to which our thoughts naturally 

 turn in conclusion of our general subject. Perhaps we have not 

 observed enough yet, to determine full}^ and finally what this 

 influence is to be. I will, however, make a suggestion. 



I doubt if any men, possessing the means of civilization, have 

 inhabited a country in which the two most important elements 

 have been combined in such large proportions — the bracing efl'ect 

 of cold for men, and the growing influences of warmth and mois- 

 ture for the production of those agricultural products most neces- 

 sary for him and most largely conducive to wealth. In the high 

 latitudes the winters are too long and cold, as well as the summers 

 too short, for the production of those grains, fruits, &c. which are 

 necessary for a wealthy community and the highest forms of civil- 

 ization. In fact, when the average temperature of the year falls 

 below 40 deg. or 35 deg,, at least it is scarcely possible for the 

 population to become dense at all ; and even a sparse population 

 can hardly raise so much in the summer as they need for their 

 support during the long and severe winter that ensues ; and the 

 faculties of men seem also to be in a measure crippled and stinted 

 by the rigors of the climate. In tropical countries the heat is 

 undoubtedly too great for the production of the highest type of 

 man. Any men would undoubtedly become degenerated in a few 

 generations by the enfeebling influences of such continued heat. 

 Nor is this all. Although there are some forms of vegetable pro- 

 duction of the highest, nay, of indispensable value to the life of 

 highly civilized men, which can be produced only in the lono- 

 summers and under the continued heat of a tropical, or nearly 

 tropical sun, yet even in such favored lands those crops which are 

 most necessary, and contribute the largest amount to the wealth 

 of the community, either do not grow at all, or do not succeed 

 well. A simple and suflScient proof of this is found in the fact 

 that land is never worth so much per acre in the tropics and in 

 latitudes closely bordering upon them, as in latitudes farther 

 removed from the equatorial heat. Wheat will scarcely grow at 

 all in the lands best adapted to rice, cotton and sugar-cane. The 

 corn that will grow on those lands is neither so good, nor does it 

 yield so well, as that which we raise in the northern portions of 



