WHERE IT IS REALLY COLD.

North Otago Times, 22 May 1909, Page 3 (Supplement)

WHERE IT IS REALLY COLD.

A person who Ims never been In the Polar regions can probably have no idea of what cold really Is; butby reading the lerrible experience of Arctic travellers in that icy region some notion can be formed of the extreme cold that prevails there. When we have the temperature bolow freezing-point out of doors we think it bitterly cold, and, if our houses were not, as warm as, say, GOdcg. above zero, we should begin to talk of freezing. Think, then, of living where the thermometer goes down to 35deg. telow zero in the house, in spite of the stove. Of course, in such a caso the fur garments are piled on until am an looks like a great bundle of skins. Dr. Moss, of the English Polar expedition of 1875 and 1876, ,amon g other odd things, tells of the effect of cold on a wax-candle which ho burned. The temperature was 35dcg. below zero, and the doctor must been considerably discouraged when, upon looking at his candle, he discovered that the flame had all it could do to keep warm. It was so cold that the flame could not melt all lite wax of the candle, leaving a sort of skeleton of the candle standing. There was heat enough, howover, to melt oddly-shaped holes in the thin walls of wax, and the resuit was a beautiful lace-like cylinder of white, with a tongue of vollotf (lame burning inside of it and sending out into the darkness many streaks of light.