Project Gutenberg's How Spring Came in New England, by Charles Dudley Warner

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Title: How Spring Came in New England

Author: Charles Dudley Warner

Last Updated: February 22, 2009
Release Date: August 22, 2006 [EBook #3131]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOW SPRING CAME IN NEW ENGLAND ***

Produced by David Widger

HOW SPRING CAME IN NEW ENGLAND

By Charles Dudley Warner

New England is the battle-ground of the seasons. It is La Vendee. To
conquer it is only to begin the fight. When it is completely subdued,
what kind of weather have you? None whatever.

What is this New England? A country? No: a camp. It is alternately
invaded by the hyperborean legions and by the wilting sirens of the
tropics. Icicles hang always on its northern heights; its seacoasts
are fringed with mosquitoes. There is for a third of the year a contest
between the icy air of the pole and the warm wind of the gulf. The
result of this is a compromise: the compromise is called Thaw. It is the
normal condition in New England. The New-Englander is a person who is
always just about to be warm and comfortable. This is the stuff of which
heroes and martyrs are made. A person thoroughly heated or frozen is
good for nothing. Look at the Bongos. Examine (on the map) the Dog-Rib
nation. The New-Englander, by incessant activity, hopes to get warm.
Edwards made his theology. Thank God, New England is not in Paris!

Hudson's Bay, Labrador, Grinnell's Land, a whole zone of ice and
walruses, make it unpleasant for New England. This icy cover, like the
lid of a pot, is always suspended over it: when it shuts down, that is
winter. This would be intolerable, were it not for the Gulf Stream. The
Gulf Stream is a benign, liquid force, flowing from under the ribs of
the equator,--a white knight of the South going up to battle the giant
of the North. The two meet in New England, and have it out there.

This is the theory; but, in fact, the Gulf Stream is mostly a delusion
as to New England. For Ireland it is quite another thing. Potatoes ripen
in Ireland before they are planted in New England. That is the reason
the Irish emigrate-