Grey River Argus FRIDAY, February 15th., 1929. JACK FROST IN EUROPE.

Grey River Argus, 15 February 1929, Page 4

Grey River Argus FRIDAY, February 15th., 1929. JACK FROST IN EUROPE.

South of the Equator, owing doubtless to the far greater preponderance of water, with its effect of equalising temperature, the natives of few lands are by experience qualified adequately to realise the nature of a hard winter in the Northern Hemisphere. The icy hand, therefore, which Nature has laid upon the European continent is a phenomenon to excite rather our wonderment and conjecture. Its effect is best indieat- 1 ed by the news that already nearly twenty thousand deaths are directly or indirectly attributed to the visitation, which, in its extent, is said to be unprecedented, at least during the past century. This can be imagined when it is reported that the temperature in some European countries at present is on a par with that at the Bay of Whales, whilst London itself is several degrees colder than even Spitsbergen is, within the Arctic Circle. Rivers in all directions -are frozen, including several in Britain, and on the Black Sea there is skating, whilst the Baltic has locked over a hundred ships in solid ice which had been expecting to escape it. The outdoor life is certainly at a discount in Europe just at present, its Gipsy votaries having in numbers been found frozen to death, not to mention sentries on the Rhine, as well as motor and railway travellers. The dreaded influenza has found an ally in the frost, and its ravages are fast widening. Although it is said the worst is not yet, the world will hope that the mysterious forces responsible for the catastrophe may relent immediately. As to the prosneets, many will now doubtless turn for guidance to the meteorologist whom the cables report to have very accurately predicted ithe severity of this winter more than a year in advance. He was ,a famous French scientist, the Abbe Moreux, Director of the Bourges Observatory, who in January of last year predicted that the Thames would freeze over, and that Western Europe would experience a winter akin to the conditions in the ice age. That glacial, or Pleistocene epoch, so the theory is, saw the northern hemisphere covered with great sheets of ice, and indeed large tracts of both the pre-sent-day temperate zone.":. The fossils of huge animals and reptiles discovered from time to time in Asiatic ice suggest, on the other hand, an invasion- by the ice of regions previously warmer. Scientists are not agreed as to the causes of extreme climatic fluctuations, although it is obvious that solar radiation varies in its effects according as does the earth s surface. The Gulf Stream has not availed to save Britain. Allusions to the ice age recall the fact that some authorities say the European ice cap melted quickly. Thus a variation in the earth s orbit might suggest itself as a possible explanation. Whether or not there is a sunken continent in the Pacific, it is evident that glaciers extended seawards on this coast beyond the present margin of the land. Of course, the natural assumption is that the present experience of Europe is not likely to recur in a lifetime, despite the theory that the earth is gradually losing heat, since the solar heat is the governing factor. _ The whole European population is certainly experiencing such a severe time of it that the wish may father the thought. The heartening feature of this critical situation is the help extended to sufferers m every country, and the courageous stand taken against nature’s menace to humanity.