A COLD CORNER.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume III, Issue 698, 6 May 1916, Page 11

A COLD CORNER.

i CLIMAIE OF ERZEROUM. j That corner of Asia where the j Turks are in peril of being smashed j between the Russian anvil and the I British hammer comprises within a J distance of barely the length of the | British Isies most extraordinary j ranges of temperature. The Russians, we are told, stormed Erzeroum | with the thermometer recording |s4deg. of frost; barely 800 miles I south the base of the British Mesapotamia force on the Persian Gulf is ] situated in what is surely the warmest place on our globe, where 150dcg. in the shade has been registered on British warships. The interior of the peninsula between the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea is one of the few regions of the carfh which remains terra incognita, the terrific heat experienced there keeping the most intrepid explorer outside its 000,000 square, miles. The severity of the winter in the neighbourhood of Erzeroum results from its situation on an elevated plateau, which is at an average height of (iOOOft above sea level, and this makes ;ill the difference between its climate and that of the South of Italy, which is in the same latitude. The French Riviera is 250 miles nearer the Arctic than Erzeroum, and the Cornish "Riviera" at least 700 miles near the icy north; but Cornwall gets the full benefit of the Gulf Stream, that marvellous hot-water system of the .North Atlantic, which saves Western Europe from the frigid temperatures of Central Asia and Labrador, on the s:mie parallels of latitude.