176 E. DU FAUR. 



THE EFFECT OF POLAR ICE on the WEATHER. 

 By E. Du Fair, f.r.g.s. 



[With Plates XIII. -XVI.] 



[Read before the Royal Society of N, S. Wales, December 4, 1907. 



The immediate incentive towards the preparation of my 

 present paper was a sub-leader appearing in the Evening 

 Neivs, Sydney, of October last, headed 'Icebergs and 

 Weather,' in which the writer stated: — 



"There is one source of information which our meteorologists 

 have not tapped, and that is, the weather conditions of the 

 Antarctic Ocean. The prevalence of icebergs in the northern 

 portion of that ocean is supposed, to cause a showery summer in 

 the south ui New Zealand, followed by plentiful rains in winter, 

 and their influence is acknowledged even in India. In the northern 

 hemisphere, the people of Norway, who depend for their living on 

 the tourist traffic, anticipate the value of the summer's business 

 by the condition of the ice around Iceland. Perhaps Professor 

 David, on his visit to the Antarctic seas, may be able to tell us 

 something more of this important question, and whether the con. 

 ditions prevailing in those regions — of which floating icebergs are 

 symptomatic — influence our weather during the following year." 



On reading this I at once furnished the editor with printed 

 evidence that I had brought this matter before the public, 

 first in a letter to the Sydney Morning Herald, of 7th 

 February, 1881, and again more fully in a paper read by 

 me before the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia, 

 in September 1891, on "Antarctic Exploration." Both of 

 these papers are so entirely out of date, that I think I am 

 justified in repeating to a great extent my former words. 



In my paper of September 1891, apart from the general 

 subject of Antarctic exploration, and the possibility of a 



