It was observed by the navigator, Ross, that moose, reindeer, wolves, musk-ox, white bear, and foxes seek winter quarters toward the north rather than to the south, and return when the season becomes favorable, with their young. Fish are noticed to come south but not to return.
As to water fowl, how far they could follow this opening into the center of the Earth, the writer will leave for others to conjecture.
It has often been a query from whence came the Arctic elephants, the remains of which are found so plentifully on the north shores of Siberia, some of which during the last century have been in such a state of preservation as that their flesh was eatable by bears and wolves.
Why were they protected by a covering of hair if not originating in a colder climate than exists south of the Arctic Circle?
Do they not still exist in the interior, or have they passed out with the great Auk, a former external resident?
Why are the latitudes nearest the poles the favorite fishing grounds for whales? Is not the interior ocean of fresh water their natural breeding ground and from thence passing out through Behring Strait and other channels into the outer waters? Can some scientist give us reliable information as to where whales propagate most, and why it is necessary for whaling expeditions to seek high latitudes for their catch?
The hole, fifteen hundred miles across, would not give any conscious impression of there being such an opening. You could not stand and inspect it like looking down a well. This hole opens into a new world unexplored by man, unless it is possible that Sir John Franklin and the Aeronaut Nansen unintentionally drifted in and were unable to navigate themselves out.
It must also, in marking out this theory, be admitted that as the center of the Earth is approached this opening must be somewhat enlarged, and must assume a concave shape from the center; such being the case, the diameter must increase from one thousand to two thousand miles or more, which is very likely to be the fact. With the motion or revolution of the Earth, the water would assume this condition on principle of the swinging of a pail of water over the head, and would merely be a placid ocean as boundless to the eye as the waters on the surface.
In these expanses of water, it is quite reasonable to presume that islands and large bodies of land may exist the same as outside, and that many fossil specimens thought to have existed on the outer surface in an early antiquity may have originated in the center of the Earth and may even still exist; their ancient skeletons having been thrown to the Earth’s surface by the centrifugal forces of water in the same way that all the different stratas of rock have been cast up and mixed in one grand conglomeration from the Earth’s center to its circumference. These facts seem clearly to prove by these migratory birds and animals: First an open sea; second it must be fresh water or mostly so; third, it must produce or contain desirable food elements different from what exist in the ocean on the outside, on which these birds can live when they reach their breeding grounds from which they are reported to return with largely augmented numbers. Now this consistent query can arise: Do they stop at a near point after passing this great boundary line of ice and find suitable and pleasant feeding grounds, or go on 500 or 1,000 miles farther? At that distance, the water is more likely to be modified in temperature and better adapted to their tastes and comfort. It seems quite right to assume that they come to inland seas, and pleasant bays, and sounds supplied with food from their shores and feeding grounds, rather than being supplied with anything existing on external parts of the Earth; otherwise, their supply must all be drawn under the ice belt or pass through this great Arctic filter. Again this thought comes up. How did these birds get sight of or learn of this internal feeding, and probably breeding ground? As migratory birds usually fly at great height, they would have an advantage over man in seeing this open ocean, as it is reasonable to think they may have bred as well as fed there. It is only a natural sequence of their migration in and out of this belt or ice circle, just as we recognize their flight north and south with the season’s changes.
If they go there by instinct, they merely do what is credited to the realm of life, considered lower in the scale of thoughts than man; but if by exploration and reason, then man must take a lower scale in calculation than the goose. To conclude this point. If birds live on vegetation, there must be an abundant supply of fresh water to produce it. If they live on fish, there must be the same sufficiency of fresh water in which to breed, feed, and live. If the birds breed, they must have hospitable shores on which to dwell and rest, and favoring skies to contribute to their various wants in order to exist.