"Yes--the weather. And our queerly shortened winter days. All these abnormal conditions which have come upon us this winter. Xenephrene has affected us astronomically--in just one way. The inclination of the axis of our earth is altering! Do you know what that really means? Can you explain it to the public?" "He can," Freddie burst out. "He will." * * * * * The axis of the earth! Our seasons--our winter and summer--our climate--our days and nights--changing, permanently changing? It seemed for an instant, nothing. And then it seemed a thought too amazing, too unnatural to encompass. The basic order of everything from time immemorial now to be changed? And as I listened to his swift, brusque words my head reeled with it. The axis of the earth was slowly swinging so that eventually our South Pole would point directly to the sun and there become stabilized. This would occur on April 5 next. Our new seasons, our new astronomical year, would begin on that date. "Can you realize what that will mean, Peter? When our South Pole points to the sun there will be a torrid zone in the southern hemisphere. The great Antarctic polar continent will blaze into a tropical glory. Patagonia, the Magellan Straits, Australia, the Federated Cape Provinces, far southern Chile and the Argentine--all in the blazing tropics. Six months of that, with days months long in which the sun never sets! Then swinging back to winter. "The new temperate zone will be at our equator. Not very temperate. Snow and ice alternating with months of blazing heat. And all our northern hemisphere--it will have six months, beginning next April, of total darkness and frightful cold." His voice rose to a grim power. "Ah, you're just beginning to realize what it will mean to us! New seasons, and new periods of day and night! Blazing noon at the South Pole! Dark, silent, congealed midnight in the north. Darkness like a cold black shroud over most of our northern hemisphere. Our greatest cities are here, Peter. London, New York, Paris, Berlin, Tokyo, Peking--from forty to fifty North Latitude. All will be buried for months in the darkness of arctic night!" He laughed just a little wildly. "They think it is a joke now, this strange new winter which has descended upon us. They're beginning, in New York, to treat it like a Canadian winter carnival. Fun while it lasts, and then spring and summer will come soon again--because they always have before. But this time, Peter, spring and summer won't come soon again. "The winter will grow colder. They have only seen its carnival aspect so far. But the cold of the north has fangs. It's a monster--a hideous monster whose congealing breath is death. It's lurking up there, ready to creep upon us. It's in Canada now--in north Asia, in northern Europe. You don't know that because our government has been so carefully suppressing the news.