THURSDAY, JANUARY 5, 1905. A HOT SPELL

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXIII, Issue 1, 5 January 1905, Page 17

THURSDAY, JANUARY 5, 1905. A HOT SPELL

MONG the many droll wooii-chttf in Tom Htodd's worts there is one which represents two s'h ode-headed mialefactons upon the scaffoW with the hangman by their side and. two fatjal nooses datfgliircg bfehtrid tftoeilr Rolls. It was in the days of public execlitiftns, which \did not tceasc in Gtroat Britain till 1868. The sfcafibPd was represented by the king of punster's as standing in the o*pe»n streeit ;An infuriated steer was tin wilder ing past fci full career, Sampling upon aid ' skying ' the spectators ; arid ane cf iihe cflmtemned pair was matde tp remark- to the atlheir : ' Say, mate, is»n't it well for us we're up here ? ' iA slomewhat similar exipresM'atn of self-dotagqatlulaticm must /have risen to tihe miMds, if ttot to the lips, of dwellers in and visitors Ho New ZQalarfd— tihe land of green fields land clear streamte— on reaJding of the fierce tidal wave of heat which brto'ke from its home Ln tlhe trdpfes and submerged New Soti^h Wales, Victoria, and Stiuth Australia in atmjo)s|).here fit only for a coolie ox a salamander. With wintry storms in Wellington, a snow-fall at Hanmer^ sleet aJrtjd boirQal blasts and .blue-coM noses all over tiie siauth, life cdmM scartely be called gay i>ver a goodly portion of New Zealand as the young new year entered in cape of far upon We scene. Yet ifc is better Ijo be ' up here,' in Uhe summer cold from wftioh there is a rcaldy reijreail, tham hefd fas»t in tjhe relentless grfcp of an Ahistralian slummar heat that rises high enough for a tfon,veivtiijdn of Salamarfders. Some of tihe facts ta-fld figures ren'eal'Od by the arubmarine cable m'aice wolul reading indeed. Here are a

lew r'andont resadiilngs of the therr^ometer in the shade : Lismore, 112; Adelaide, 114; Bramxto ( n, 116; Sydney, Parramattla, and RurM, 117 ; MiWiura (Victoria), 121.5 ; Mount HWpe, ia4 ; Berrigan, 125. Tihese re^diSngs by n 0 meaoxsi constitlute a recQ^d, but they represent a little wiorld of physical discomfort and s?uffering. At E'uston (N.S. WallesiX, iar i/nstlance, the thermometer reached 124 in the s*halde during the heat-wiave that ushered in the new year of 1898. And BaKdn van Mueller, in his 1 Select Rxtira-Trdpicai Plants,' tells how a district in the Riverinia (N.S. Wales) once stewed to the tune of 134 degrees in the sjhade. TThe deserts of the Interior, hiowqver, 'seem to be the recognised ttot-.blast furnace of Austr/alia. Lumiholtz, i n his work, ' Amang Cannibals/ ddscribes Uhem as ' 'hotter aidd more arid thain any other pairt tof Hhe earth.' An idea of their higher capabilities may Ibe gained from tihe experiences of Stiurt and his fellow-explorers in the intensely h,ot siuramer of ISI4. ' The earth,' days Sutherland, summa/rising tiheir report, 1 tfhe h'oiofs of tllie 'horses ; it st-arched tihe shoes atnid feet of the men. . . Tthe iheat was sometimes 130 in the shade, and in the sain it was altogether intolerable. They were unable to write, as tihe ink dried at :on!ce on their pdns ; their combs siplit ; tlieir nails became brittle and readily broke , and if they touched a piece of metal it blistered their fingers. In tjheir extremity, tihey dug an Underground room, deep enough to be bey,cnd the dreadful furnace glow abiflve. Here they passed m|a)ny a long day, as month 'after mlonth passed witlhout laf sillower of rain.' v

DlMrimg "Bhe heat-wa(ve of the pas.t few days, New South Wiales has bean the c*hief sufferer. The Mother Startd haa h v ad keener sufferimgs than tfiose that arise from Unpleasiaintly high temperatures, and the devastation caused wiflhm its borders by bush hres recalls in a measure, tihe aigyxny v^hifch Victoria went tffroiugff on the day kno^n in its history as Black Thursday, when alrfosit the w<hole c^olomy was ablaze, when flhe asjies from its Hurnin(g " fierds antS foresfs fell thick on 'the decks of vessels sixty miles (jut to sea, whefn the smoke impeded navigation, and many of the soared inhabitants fancied that the wiorFd's las-t day (had come. Vast and widely separated areas of New South Wales have bean afire during tihe past few days. Reports tripkhng through tihe Submarine wires tell, for instance, of fires that swept an -area of fifty miles by thirty between Tunfut and J'lrnee ; 200, 0Q0 acres in the Oarcoar district; ten miles by sixty abound Burrowa ; and a hfcrJtlred and fifty miles square about Guindagjai. Grass, arops, stock, fqnees have been dat«n u-p by the flames— looo sflieep destroyed bexe, 2000 there, 10,000 elsewhere. One station allqiie in t(he Riverina lost 40,000 acres of grass. The destruction cm Kimo station is set down at £10,000. Numbers of farmers dnd pastoral iste have been ruined. Exciting tales have been totd of townships combatimg the ah vicing ftres for dear life, and (s,ays one of the latent cabl« messages) ' many harrowing details are given by «h,ose suffering losses, as well as marrow eacaipes by Wornqn and tfiiKdrdn, wiho saved themselves by lying *n talnks, fn water-holes, ajid in the riivers, while their menEol'k fought the flames.' As we write, the fires have been somewhat checked by welcome falte of rain, and t«he eiild of the s\pell of red desitrtuctioti has, we hope, at leingth dome flo our afflicted fellow-subjects beyosnd the Tasmian Sea.