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CHAPTER XII. 



THE NORTHWARD MOVEMENT OF THE SURFACE PROVED BY 

 THE CLTMATE OF THE LAND IN THE NORTHERN HEMI- 

 SPHERE GETTING COLDER. 



We have evidences of the northern movement of the surface in 

 the changes of the temperature of the northern hemisphere. 



Within the limits of the historic records we have abundant 

 proofs of the climate of Europe getting gradually colder, and 

 that the inhabitants of the north are continually retrograding 

 southward. The first settlers in Iceland found extensive dis- 

 tricts of that now dreary country covered with forests of birch 

 and fir. They were also able to cultivate barley and other grain. 

 At present the whole island is a naked desert, the native woods 

 have totally disappeared, and the Icelanders have long since 

 relinquished, for good reasons, the practice of growing corn. 

 The relics of the past in this island are few, but sufficient to 

 prove its former habitable state. One of the most remarkable 

 circumstances attending the discovery of Iceland is, that relics 

 were found there which showed that it had been previously in- 

 habited. The nature of these relics, which consisted of bells, 

 wooden crosses, and books in the Irish character, induced the 

 Norwegians to believe that those prior inhabitants were Chris- 

 tians either from Scotland or from Ireland. 



The most ancient of the Icelandic chronicles are not con- 

 tented with mentioning the vestiges of former inhabitants, they 

 distinctly state that there were actual settlements on the island 

 previous to the Norwegian emigration *. 



They name Kirkinbui, one of the warm and fertile valleys that 

 occur on the southern coast, as the residence of those papa, as 

 they called strangers, who deserted the island, it is added, from 

 their aversion to the pagan colonists. 



Greenland, according to most of the Icelandic histories, was 

 discovered in 982, and peopled four years later. But there 



* Lardner's Cyclopaedia, Maritime Discovery, vol. i. p. 216. 



