Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 28.djvu/733

Rh common in our "lake States." Nevertheless, the currents of the lakes have been the means of distributing seeds on the jutting headlands of the northern coast, where a few southern forms have been found. On the other hand, the cooling effect of such large bodies of water encourages the growth of northern species, and thus around the coasts of Lake Superior the flora includes a few semi-Arctic plants, though inland these all disappear, and the vegetation is of a more northern temperate type. Only a few trees have the faculty of making themselves at home over as wide an extent as some herbaceous plants; and these are those usually which have light or winged seeds. One reason for the different development of this faculty in trees and herbs is probably that the seeds of trees are of greater size and weight, and less easily carried away from their parent. A break in the westward extension of a considerable number of the forest-trees occurs beyond Lake Superior and Red River. This is ascribed to the greater dryness of the climate west of that lake, the effect of which is also seen in the alleged superior quality of the wood of the aspen and spruce trees. Too much moisture in the atmosphere has also its results in determining the range of trees. The same causes which prevent the range westward beyond Red River of many of the Eastern trees, also prevail in restricting the eastward range of the British Columbia trees beyond the influence of the Rocky Mountains.

Local Climates of Exposure.—Professor W. Mattieu Williams, in the "Gentleman's Magazine," quotes with approval Dr. Frankland's recommendation of elevated snow covered districts as winter sanitariums, and adds some observations of his own. Pertinently to the subject of reflection from waters, Professor Williams notices the position of Torbay, so celebrated for its mild winter climate, as on the one part of the Devonshire coast that has the most direct exposure to the east. "It hugs the east winds that blow directly into it from the open sea, and has no protection whatever from them. Paignton is the most directly exposed and the warmest part of the bay; the next is Torquay, or rather the Paignton side of Torquay." The mildness of the Torquay climate is also promoted by favorable inclination to reflection of the early morning sun-heat of the slopes, and by the tempering to which the east winds are subjected before reaching the land. At Broadstairs "is a little sandy bay backed by cliffs and facing directly east. I have several times on a sunny day in winter-time walked along the sands from the Granville side of Ramsgate to Broadstairs, and have been much interested in observing the sudden change of climate experienced on turning the projecting cliff forming the south horn of the bay. Ladies sit on the sands there with needlework and novels in the month of December." The sea-reflection is in many cases powerfully supplemented by cliff-reflection. "When the aspect is due south, as at Hastings, it overrides it altogether. The peculiar climate of Hastings is, I think, entirely due to this, for here we have the anomaly of sea cliffs that have been deserted by the sea, which has left sufficient fore-shore for houses to be built between it and the cliffs. In the winter these cliffs warm these houses by reflecting the southward mid-day sun; in the summer they roast them. Not only do cliffs reflect some of the sun's rays during the day, but they absorb the remainder and give it out after the sun has set. . . . Other local climatic influences may be noted; among them the effect of a stretch of dry sand above high-water mark and at the foot of cliffs."

The Quaternary Moose of New Jersey.—Professor W. B. Scott has described, before the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, a very large extinct moose or elk, the almost complete fossil skeleton of which, now in the Museum of Princeton College, was discovered in a shell-marl deposit under a bog at Mount Hermon, New Jersey. With the exception of five caudal vertebræ, every important bone of the skeleton that is missing is represented by its fellow of the opposite side, so that it has been hardly possible to go astray in making the necessary restorations. The skeleton is of an adult but not old individual, and appears to belong to the same species with one described by Wistar, and called by Harlan Corvus Americanus, which, together with some metacarpals described by Leidy, is preserved in the