| As the ice sheets advanced, the plant life changed. | | | | salesmen of an earlier day. Since the Egyptians, |
| The most tender died out first, or were driven | | | | Assyrians, Babylonians, Phoenicians, Greeks and |
| southward, and then the more and more hardy, until | | | | Romans knew only lands that were warm, or where |
| finally their remains were ground to dust beneath the | | | | the snow and ice of winter were sure to give way |
| ice. Then, centuries later, the ice receded and the | | | | each year to the warmth of summer, ice played little |
| plants moved northward again in a slow but steady | | | | part in their mythology. |
| advance to reclaim the land. Animal life, including man. | | | | But the Norsemen, who knew about ice from |
| also retreated before the glaciers, making certain | | | | everyday experience, thought the whole universe had |
| adjustments to the changing environment. Some | | | | once been ice, that the first god had been licked from |
| species, unable to make the necessary changes, died | | | | a block of ice by a celestial cow, and that the frost |
| out and were lost completely. Others modified their | | | | giants were the main enemies of gods and men. |
| habits and survived. In a few cases the great ice | | | | Eventually, so the northern stories went, the frost |
| sheets swallowed up individuals, freezing and | | | | giants and their allies would be victorious, and, in the |
| preserving them for ages. Occasionally one of these | | | | twilight of the gods, the whole world would sink into a |
| naturally refrigerated relics has come to light, | | | | chaos of ice and snow, flame and destruction. But |
| mammoths being the ones that have been given the | | | | sometime, long before the days of the mythmakers, |
| most publicity. These finds are awe-inspiring because | | | | man first realized that ice and cold were not complete |
| of their great age and extraordinary state of | | | | enemies. By making use of them, he could preserve |
| preservation, but, thanks to modern science, there is no | | | | part of his scanty food supply, saving it in times when |
| mystery about them. | | | | hunting was good for use later. Nobody kept records |
| In bygone days, when one of these animals escaped | | | | in those days. |
| from its age-old cold storage chamber, it was the | | | | No one knows who kindled the first fire, chipped the |
| source of many legends. Its bones became those of | | | | first arrowhead, molded the first pot. No one knows |
| saints and heroes, of super-beings and demigods. | | | | who made the first halting discovery of refrigeration. |
| They were sold as holy relics or powerful charms to | | | | Maybe it was a hunter who noticed that meat stayed |
| credulous persons who believed the tales told by | | | | fresh longer when stored in the coolest part of his |
| canny and perhaps only slightly less credulous | | | | cave. Maybe it was a hunter's wife. |
