7 PRODUCTIONS OF THE EARTH. 78. What are the productions of the earth? A. They are either vegetable, animal, or mineral. 79 What are vegetable productions? A. Those things that grow out of the ground, as trees, plants, grain, fruits and flowers. 80. What are the vegetable productions most useful to mankind? A. Wheat, corn, rye, rice, potatoes, bread-fruit, &c. 81. What are the chief classes of the animal kingdom? A. Beasts, birds, fishes, reptiles, and insects. 82. What are minerals? A. They consist of substances of various kinds, that are dug out of the earth. 83. What are the principal classes of minerals? A. Four: the metallic, the inflammable, precious stones, and building-stones. 84. What are the most important metallic minerals? A. They are gold, silver, iron, copper, and lead. Diamonds are highly valuable, and are often found amongst the arth, at the bottoms of rivers. The engraving represents a river in South America, from which the water has been nearly all pumped out by the machine on the right hand of the picture, and negro slaves are examining the earth for diamonds. 87. What are some of the principal building-stones? A. Granite, limestone, marble, chalk, slate, and sandstone. Mineral springs, both hot and cold, occur in many parts of the earth. The most remarkable are the Geysers, or Spouting springs of Iceland, which throw up volumes of hot water, with a noise like cannon, to the height of 90 or 100 feet. 8 ON THE FORM AND MOTIONS OF THE EARTH. 88. What is the earth? A. It is the planet we inhabit. 89. What are the planets? A. Immense bodies, which revolve round the sun and receive their light from him. 90. What is the shape or form of the earth? A. It is like an orange, being slightly flattened at the poles. 91. By what other names is the earth known? A. It is also called the World, the Globe, and the Sphere. 92. How many motions has the earth, and what are they? A. Two; the daily and the yearly. 93. What is the daily motion of the earth? A. That in which it turns round every twenty-four hours. 94. What is the yearly motion of the earth? A. That in which it goes round the sun once every year. 95. What takes place during the earth's yearly motion? A. A change of seasons. 96. What is a change of seasons? A. The change from winter to spring, from spring to summer, from summer to autumn, and from autumn to winter again. 97. What is the length of the path travelled over by the earth every year, in its passage round the sun? A. Upwards of 567 millions of miles, or more than a thousand miles every minute. 98. What is the effect of the earth's daily motion? A. It produces a change from day to night. 99. If the earth did not turn round on its axis, what effect would be produced? A. The day and night would then each be six months long, and, consequently, there would be but one day and one night in the year. In that case, our earth would be scarcely habitable. 100. What do these things teach us? A. That the works of the Almighty are directed by infinite wisdom and goodness. 9 101. What is the axis of the earth? A. It is an imaginary line passing through its centre North and South. 102. What are the poles of the earth? A. The ends of the axis. 103. How many poles are there? A. Two; the North, and the South Pole. 104. Where are the poles situated? A. The North Pole is the north point of the earth's axis, and the South Pole is the south point. Point out on Map of the World, No. 1, of the Atlas, the North Pole and the South Pole. You will perceive that this map consists of the Eastern and Western Hemispheres, that is, a map of both sides of the arth presented to view at once; and although the words North Pole and South Pole are engraved twice, yet there is but one North Pole and ane South Pole. 105. How far distant are the poles situated from each other? A. One hundred and eighty degrees. 106. How many miles is that? About 12,500 miles, which is half round the world. 107. What is the size or bulk of the earth? A. It is nearly 25,000 miles in circumference, and 8,000 in diameter.* 108. What is meant by the circumference of the earth? Circumference is the distance round the middle of its sur face or outside. 109. What is meant by diameter ? The distance across or through the middle part of it. 110. If you were to run a thread round the outside of an apple, the ength of it would be the extent of the circumference; and if you were to cut the apple through the middle and measure it across the cut part, that would be the diameter. umference Circun Diameter 111. So great is the circumference of the earth, that if a man could travel without interruption from water, it would take him one thousand days, or three years, to come round to the place he started from, reckoning that he travelled twenty five miles every day. 10 112. What are the circles of the earth? The equator, the tropics, the polar circles, and the parallels and meridians.. 113. Are these circles alike in extent? The equator and meridians only are of the same extent, and are called the great circles. 114. What are the other circles? The Tropical and Polar circles, and the Parallels. These being smaller in extent than the former are called small circles. 115. What is the Equator? An imaginary great circle extending east and west round the globe, and at an equal distance from each pole. On map of the World, No. 1, the Equator is the line that passes through the middle of both hemispheres. You will find the word equator near it. 116. What is the distance of the Equator from the Poles ? It is 90 degrees, or about 6250 miles from the North Pole, and the same from the South Pole. The exact size and figure of the earth are not yet known: further measurements op all parts of its surface are necessary to determine these points rigidly. 1 117. What are the Tropics? They are two smaller circles runmng like the Equator East and West. 118. Where are they placed? At the distance of 23 degrees, or 1637 miles, north and south from the equator. Arctic Tropic of Cancer Equator Tropic of Capricom Circles. 119. What are the names of the Tropics? The northern tropic is called the Tropic of Cancer, and the southern is called the Tropic of Capricorn. Point out on map of the World, No. 1., the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. You will find them between the figures 20 and 30 that are printed on the edge of the map. 11 120. What are the Polar Circles? Two small circles running east and west. 121. Where are they placed? At the distance of 23 degrees from each Pole. 122. What are their names? The Arctic Circle is the northern polar circle, and the Ant arctic Circle is the southern polar circle. Point out on map of the World, No. 1, the Arctic and Antarctic circles. They are between the figures 60 and 70, which are engraved on the edge of the map. Parallels. 123. What are the Parallels? Circles extending east and west. Meridians. |