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Climate Change The Science of Global Warming and Our Energy Future 2nd Edition Edmond A. Mathez
To our children, Sophia and Lucas, and Anaïs and Emile, and to all the others of their generation who will bear many of the burdens of climate change and who will ultimately be tasked with finding a path to a more sustainable future.
Preface xi
Prologue 1
Weather and Climate 1
The Climate System 2
Climate Change: Separating Facts from Fears 5
Thinking About the Future in the Face of Uncertainty 8
The Story 9
PART I. THE CLIMATE SYSTEM
1. The Atmosphere 13
The Composition of Air 13
The Compressibility and Pressure of Air 15
Mechanisms of Heat and Mass Transfer 16
The Thermal and Compositional Layering of the Atmosphere 21
The General (Global) Circulation of the Atmosphere 29
Key Points in This Chapter 40
2. The World Ocean 43
Important Properties of Water 44
The Ocean’s Layered Structure 49
The Ocean’s Surface Currents 53
Global Flows of Water Through the Ocean 57
The Hydrological Cycle 63
Key Points in This Chapter 65
3. Ocean–Atmosphere Interactions 69
Exchanges at the Ocean–Atmosphere Interface 69
The El Niño–Southern Oscillation 71
Other Modes of Ocean and Atmosphere Variability 88
Key Points in This Chapter 97
4. The Carbon Cycle and How It Influences Climate 101
Reservoirs of Carbon 104
The Carbon Cycle 105
The Acidification of the Ocean 118
Uncertainties in the Carbon Cycle 126
Key Points in This Chapter 128
PART II. CLIMATE CHANGE AND ITS DRIVERS
5. The Concept of Radiation Balance, a Scientific Framework for Thinking About Climate Change 133
Electromagnetic Radiation 136
The Greenhouse Effect 142
Earth’s Radiation Balance 143
Geographical and Seasonal Variations in Energy Balance 152
Key Points in This Chapter 160
6. Radiative Forcing, Feedbacks, and Some Other Characteristics of the Climate System 163
Radiative Forcing 163
Greenhouse Gases as Forcing Factors 164
Aerosols 171
Land-Use Change 174
Natural Forcing Factors 175
Feedbacks 182
Tipping Points 188
Committed Warming 189
Key Points in This Chapter 190
7. Learning from the Climate of the Distant Past 193
The Ice Age and Paleoclimatology 193
Earth’s Orbital Characteristics and Milankovitch Theory 197
Five Million Years of Climate 202
One Hundred Thousand Years of Climate Change 211
A Lesson from the Distant Past: The Paleocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum 220
Key Points in This Chapter 224
PART III. CONSEQUENCES OF CLIMATE CHANGE
8. The Climate of the Recent Past and Impacts on Human History 229
Climate Proxies 229
Early to Mid-Holocene Climate Change and Human Development 238
The Rise and Fall of Civilizations 246
Key Points in This Chapter 260
9. Observing the Change 265
A Century of Warming 266
Precipitation and Drought 275
Why Some Water Supplies Are in Jeopardy 283
Severe Storms and Other Extreme Events 284
The Sensitive Arctic 290
Key Points in This Chapter 302
10. Greenland, Antarctica, and Sea-Level Rise 305
Recent Sea-Level Rise and the Factors Contributing to It 306
The Greenland Ice Sheet 313
The Antarctic Ice Sheets 318
Future Sea-Level Rise 321
Key Points in This Chapter 328
PART IV. THE FUTURE
11. Climate Models and the Future 333
What Are Climate Models? 334
Peering into the Future 346
Responding to Our Climate Future 351
Key Points in This Chapter 352
12. Climate Change Risk in an Unknowable Future 355
Climate–Emissions Uncertainties 355
What Is Risk? 357
Some Properties of Climate Change Risk 360
Climate Change and Human Strife 365
Key Points in This Chapter 372
13. Energy and the Future 375
Electricity Circa 2017 377
Coal: A Vast Enterprise 380
Natural Gas: A Bridge Fuel? 390
The Nuclear Option 395
Wind and Solar Power: Icons for the Future 404
What About Hydropower? 413
Intermittent Power and the Electrical Grid 416
Key Points in This Chapter 418
Epilogue 421
Notes 425
Glossary 453
Bibliography 463
Index 489
PREFACE
The genesis of the first edition of Climate Change: The Science of Global Warming and Our Energy Future was a document to support the development of the American Museum of Natural History’s special exhibition Climate Change: Threat to Life and Our Energy Future, which opened in New York City in October 2008 and for which one of us (EAM) served as co-curator. Thus the original book was highly generalized, written, as it was, for a relatively broad audience. Since the time of writing the first edition and through our continued classroom experiences, however, it became apparent that university students need a more substantial introduction to climate science. Thus was born this second edition, which is much expanded from the first. Its target audiences include undergraduate students in beginning to upper-division climate courses, as well as graduate students in nontechnical programs such as education, journalism, and environmental policy. We seek to appeal to this wide university audience with a conceptual focus on the subject matter, avoiding complex mathematical formulations and layering content by consigning detailed or focused arguments to boxes. We hope that this approach will provide instructors with a basis for more in-depth classroom investigation.
This edition also takes on a somewhat more didactic character than the first. Each chapter ends with a roundup called “Key Points in This Chapter,” in which the chapter’s salient points are listed. Most chapters also contain a section titled “Back-of-the-Envelope Calculation,” in which a simple computation illustrates one of the relevant chapter principles. Each “Historical Note” presents a biographical sketch of a scientist central to the development of climate science, providing the historical context of our present knowledge. Readers should also understand that this book relies mainly on the primary scientific literature. We nevertheless have limited the citations on each subject to a relatively few recent references, the intent being to provide a bibliography that allows the student practical entry into the broader literature. We must emphasize, however, that the narrative is based on an enormous body of work involving thousands of people, not all of whose work is cited. Finally, similar to the first edition, this second edition is a narrative account, written more as a story than in the style of a traditional textbook.
The story of this book sets out the scientific basis for our understanding of climate change. It is divided into four parts, beginning with a description of Earth’s present climate system. We explain the workings and interactions of the atmosphere and the ocean; how they move heat around the planet and bring us familiar climate phenomena, such as the El Niño–Southern Oscillation and the monsoons; and the all-important carbon cycle, which determines the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere. Part II explores the drivers of climate change. We define the scientific framework that enables us to systematically think about climate change—the related concepts of radiation balance and radiation forcing—and investigate the greenhouse effect and other drivers of climate change. Our knowledge of how the climate system works today rests, in part, on our knowledge of how it changed in the past. We therefore also delve into paleoclimate, focusing on the global climate record of the past 2.6 million years. Part III concerns the consequences of climate change. To appreciate how climate change can affect humanity, we first turn our attention to how humans were affected by climate change over roughly the past 10,000 years. We then describe climate change as it has been observed in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and its consequences to date. All this brings us to the future. Computer models of the climate system help us understand how climate may change in the coming decades and centuries. We therefore begin Part IV with a description of climate models and their projections of what might come to pass. No one knows what the future will bring, of course, so we devote some effort to casting climate as a matter of risk. To deal with an unknown future, humanity invented the concept of risk, in which cost-benefit analysis provides a basis for rational decision making in the face of uncertainty. We thus apply the concept of risk in the context of adaptation to climate change and attempts at mitigation. Among the many aspects of these efforts, it becomes immediately apparent that of paramount concern is our ability to control emissions from the burning of fossil fuels and to apply alternative technologies to satisfy the world’s insatiable appetite for energy. This appetite is dominated by one overriding issue: how we are going to provide for the world’s electricity needs. Because of its centrality to future climate, we have chosen to focus on this matter in the final chapter of this book, at the same time recognizing that the production of energy is now (and has been) a rapidly changing enterprise.
This book found the support of many people. One of the joys of its writing was how much we learned from each other and from our many colleagues, many of whom are at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University. We are also indebted to Kent Short, Scott Mandia, Dennis Hartmann, Alessandra Grannini, Mingfang Ting, A. Park Williams, and several anonymous reviewers who suffered through early drafts of the manuscript and provided insightful suggestions for its improvement. The content of the book was also strongly influenced by the innovative legacy of climate courses taught at Columbia University, and we are grateful to the instructors who shared their support, insights, and materials over the years. Several colleagues deserve particular mention: Stephanie Pfirman, Jerry McManus, Yochanan Kushnir, Mark Cane, Ben Cook, Linda Sohl, Steve Cohen, and Louise Rosen. JES is also grateful to Henry and Lana Pollack, who inspired his transition into climate science and who remain aspirational examples of effective public communication and outreach. This book also would not have been possible without the unfailing
enthusiasm and hard work of our editor, Patrick Fitzgerald, and the technical support of manuscript editor Irene Pavitt and designer Milenda Lee, all of Columbia University Press, and of Saebyul Choe of the American Museum of Natural History. Finally, none of this would have been possible without the inspiration, support, and patience of our families. Edmond A. Mathez Jason E. Smerdon
Climate Change
Satellite view of Iceland and surrounding waters
Climate is a dynamic “system” that ultimately is driven by the energy of the Sun, but results from the dynamic interactions among Earth’s atmosphere, ocean, rock, ice, and life—all of which are observable in this photograph. The lighter ocean colors are due to phytoplankton blooms. The image was taken by NASA’s satellite Terra on June 21, 2004. (J. Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, Visible Earth, https://visibleearth.nasa .gov/view.php?id = 71461)
PROLOGUE
“Rain, heavy at times, will begin in late morning and continue into the evening hours as a cold front sweeps across the area . . .” Ah, the weather forecast—what would we do without it? There is no shortage of conversation about the weather, which, after all, touches our daily lives. For some, the weather is very important— especially if their harvest depends on it. For others, it is more tangential. We’re thinking of ourselves here; on most days, we just want to know about our treks to work in New York City. Will rain or snow make it impossible or just more miserable than usual?
And then there is climate. What might a climate forecast be like?1 “The next decade will bring persistent showers and mild temperatures from January through March and extensive periods of no rainfall at all throughout the summer months.” Hmm . . . that seems a bit remote from our immediate worry of getting to work. Although it may appear harder to connect the implications of climate to our daily lives, it is relevant. Climate dictates the kinds of clothes we keep in our closets and the way the buildings around us are made. It may drive our decisions about where to live, when we decide to visit places around the world, and what kind of car we choose to buy. So how are they different, weather and climate?
Weather and Climate
Upon reflection, it becomes clear that there are essential differences between weather and climate, even though they are inextricably linked. Weather refers to conditions in the atmosphere at any one time. The familiar radar images on television show that local weather systems develop and dissipate rapidly over the course of hours to a day. On a continent-wide scale, weather systems form and decay over days to a week or so. A persistent weather system, such as a warm spell, may last for a couple of weeks or even more, especially in mid-latitudes, where the tracks of weather systems are commonly determined by the position of the polar jet stream, as chapter 1 explains.
Climate, in contrast, can be thought of as the “average weather” for a particular region over some period of time. We place “average weather” in quotes because climate itself is changing, so a weather average must always be defined over a specific time interval that may
be different if determined over another. In any event, “region” can refer to the entire globe, as in global warming; to a large landmass, such as eastern North America; or to a small land area, as in the “microclimate” of a particular valley in a larger wine-producing region.
Although we have become adept at forecasting weather hours to a day or so ahead, predictions beyond that become progressively more uncertain with distance into the future. Weather is inherently chaotic. Strictly speaking, the term chaotic in this context means that small differences in initial conditions result in large differences in how a system will eventually develop. In other words, to predict weather accurately, we would have to know the temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, wind velocity, precipitation, and other characteristics of a weather system everywhere across an affected region, and even then prediction would be accurate for only the next week or two.
Being an average condition, climate is not chaotic—at least not in the same way that weather is. Instead, it displays stable and distinctive patterns of change on specific timescales. Examples include annual changes such as monsoons, which are shifts in winds that bring seasonal rains to a number of regions in the tropics and subtropics. They also include fluctuations that occur only every several years, the most notable of which is the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon, referring to the periodic shifts of winds and ocean currents that bring warm water to the equatorial eastern Pacific Ocean and dry conditions to the western equatorial Pacific, and that influence climate in far-flung parts of the globe.
What does all of this mean for those forecasts that we originally imagined? On a day-today basis, climatologists like to boil down the differences between climate and weather to their essence: You dress for the weather and build a house for the climate. Or how about: Climate is what you expect; weather is what you get. If you are a dog owner, you may prefer: Weather is like the dog running back and forth, and climate is like the leash driving the ultimate path. Whatever your preference—and you may have your own—these examples are illustrative of the differences and dependencies of weather and climate.
One additional point must be emphasized. Climate change is a long-term phenomenon. This inherently protracted characteristic, at least in terms of human timescales, creates one of the conundrums surrounding attempts to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from the use of fossil fuels, the main culprit in global warming. It is simply difficult to marshal either the individual or the collective will to make the changes necessary to avoid the negative impacts of global warming because they generally do not appear to affect our immediate lives.
The Climate System
Climate is a dynamic system resulting from the combined interactions of various parts of Earth with one another and with the Sun. The components include the atmosphere; the ocean (hydrosphere); glaciers, terrestrial ice sheets, and sea ice (collectively known as the cryosphere); the living biomass (biosphere); and even the solid Earth (lithosphere). Think of it as your body, with all its parts interacting in an interlocking whole. And like your body, the climate system is not just a set of physical interactions, but also a complex chemical system, with matter flowing through its various parts and influencing its characteristics.
The atmosphere, being the medium in which we live, is the part of the climate system that affects us most directly. The atmosphere contains greenhouse gases—the gases that absorb infrared (IR) radiation—and in this way, it keeps Earth’s surface in a habitable temperature range. Indeed, without such gases, Earth’s surface would be frozen and lifeless. The atmosphere also plays a major role in transporting heat and moisture around the planet. Because Earth is a sphere, the Sun’s heat is more intense near the equator than near the poles. This uneven distribution generates winds that carry heat from the equator toward the poles and from the surface to the upper atmosphere. Additionally, the atmosphere is not isolated from the ocean. The ocean circulates, in part driven by the winds and guided by the positions of continents, and thereby also transports heat toward the poles. Indeed, the ocean holds far more heat than does the atmosphere, but it flows much more slowly. Many of these interactions are also important in the transport of moisture around the planet. For instance, much of the rain that falls on land was originally evaporated from ocean water. The atmosphere therefore takes up enormous amounts of moisture and redistributes it around the globe based on its large-scale patterns of circulation. Finally, the atmosphere also holds ozone (O3), which shades the surface of Earth from much of the lethal ultraviolet (UV) radiation received from the Sun.
As for the chemical interactions, the most important are the exchanges of carbon among the atmosphere, ocean, and biosphere (which includes the dead biomass held mainly in soil). In fact, we can think of these spheres as reservoirs where nearly all the carbon on or near Earth’s surface is stored. This description leads to the concept of the carbon cycle, referring to the flow of carbon among the various reservoirs. In months to decades, photosynthesis by plants and decay of organic materials affect the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, but over longer periods, it is the ocean that exerts the dominant control on atmospheric CO2 content because the amount of carbon in the ocean is nearly 50 times that in the atmosphere. If we think of the climate system as something like our body, the atmosphere and the ocean are its main organs, and the carbon cycle is the circulation system that connects them to each other and to other organs.
Most of the carbon (more than 99.9 percent) on Earth exists not in the ocean, atmosphere, or biosphere (the “surface” reservoirs), but in a deep reservoir in the form of rocks—that is, the lithosphere. The lithosphere is part of the climate system mainly because carbon flows between it and the reservoirs on Earth’s surface, but this flow is far slower than the flow of carbon among the surface reservoirs. Over millions of years, a close balance has apparently persisted between two processes:
• The flow of carbon from the surface to the rock reservoirs by means of the removal of CO2 from the atmosphere and the ocean through the formation of carbonate and other carbon-bearing rocks
• The return of CO2 to the atmosphere by means of the breakdown of those rocks at the high temperatures and pressures of the deep Earth
In fact, this long-term balance appears to have acted as a natural, planetary thermostat, maintaining conditions on Earth’s surface that have allowed for liquid water to be stable and
that have been conducive to the evolution and survival of life since nearly the beginning of Earth’s history.
The different parts of the climate system also interact through feedbacks, or phenomena that amplify or diminish the forces that act to change climate. An example helps to envision them. As the Arctic warms due to the buildup of greenhouse gases, sea ice melts. As sea ice melts, there is less bright ice to reflect solar energy back to space, and the ocean absorbs more energy. The greater absorption of energy, in turn, further warms the ocean and overlying
TABLE P.1
DIFFERENT TIMESCALES OF SOME WEATHER AND CLIMATE PHENOMENA
TimescaleExample phenomena
DailyWarm days and cool nights due to solar heating and Earth’s rotation
3–7 daysWeather events, such as the passage of fronts
MonthsEastward-propagating weather disturbances across the tropical Indian and Pacific oceans due to planetary-scale fluctuations in wind patterns
YearlyWarm summers, cool winters, and shifts in zones of precipitation due to the tilt of Earth’s spin axis and its orbit around the Sun; monsoons, notably on the Indian subcontinent, due to summer heating of landmasses that draws moist winds off oceans
23–36 monthsPeriodic wind and temperature oscillations in the equatorial stratosphere due to internal atmosphere dynamics
2–7 yearsENSO events, in which changes in equatorial Pacific Ocean currents and winds result in dramatic shifts in rainfall in equatorial regions globally and in lesser shifts in the climate of some temperate regions
1–3 decadesGenerally ill-defined oscillations, such as the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, a fluctuation in ocean water temperature over the entire North Atlantic Ocean that affects temperature in adjacent landmasses
CenturiesIrregular fluctuations that have led to multi-century cold or warm periods, such as the Medieval Climate Anomaly (or Medieval Warm Period) and the Little Ice Age, the causes of which are uncertain but may be related to one or more natural phenomena, such as variations in solar irradiance and volcanism
10,000–100,000 years
Millions of years
Regular variations in orbital parameters (the slow oscillations in Earth’s tilt relative to the orbital plane, precession, and eccentricity of its orbit around the Sun) that affect the amount of energy reaching the Northern Hemisphere and are responsible for the approximately 100,000-year glacial cycles of the past 1 million years
Changes in the positions of continents, in solar luminosity, and in the composition of the atmosphere, all of which affect climate globally
Source: J. R. Christy, D. J. Seidel, and S. C. Sherwood, “What Kinds of Atmospheric Temperature Variations Can the Current Observing Systems Detect and What Are Their Strengths and Limitations, Both Spatially and Temporally?,” in Temperature Trends in the Lower Atmosphere: Steps for Understanding and Reconciling Differences, ed. T. R. Karl et al. (Washington, D.C.: Climate Change Science Program, Subcommittee on Global Change Research, 2006), 29–46.
atmosphere, causing even more ice to melt. In this way, the melting of ice amplifies the warming due to greenhouse gases alone. This feedback in part accounts for why the Arctic is more sensitive to global warming than is the rest of the planet. Feedbacks can be complex and can operate in unpredictable ways, and they are one reason that projecting future climate is fraught with uncertainty.
The climate system is complicated in other ways, one of which is that the various climate phenomena operate on different timescales (table P.1). Some of these phenomena and their associated timescales are familiar—for example, the daily variations of warm days and cool nights, and the annual passage of the seasons. Other phenomena occur on longer or irregular intervals but on timescales that are understandable, and still others occur on timescales beyond the human experience and are consequently difficult to imagine. Our knowledge of the last may also be incomplete because the evidence for them is buried (commonly and literally) in the geological record.
Climate Change: Separating Facts from Fears
What we do know from the available records, both geological and observational, is that the climate is changing. Hardly a day goes by without some mention of it in the news. Earth’s climate is warming; CO2 and other greenhouse gases have been building up in the atmosphere mainly as a consequence of the burning of fossil fuel; and the scientific evidence is now overwhelming that this buildup is causing the warming. These statements are the facts of climate change.
Less certain are how much the climate will warm in response to growing emissions and to what extent the warming will change the world around us. Should the warming be substantial, it may have huge negative impacts on biodiversity, ecosystems, agriculture, ocean life, the global economy, and the well-being of human societies everywhere. These possible results are the fears of climate change.
It is important to separate the facts from the fears. The facts give us insight, but the fears reflect the risks. Ultimately, we have to understand the risks if we are to develop intelligent policies to deal with global warming. To assess the risks, we need the knowledge, so let us start with the facts.
Observations of Climate Change: The Facts
In addition to CO2, the greenhouse gases include methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), ozone (O3), and water vapor (H2O). These gases reside mostly in the troposphere, the lower 10 to 15 kilometers (30,000–50,000 feet) of the atmosphere, where the weather occurs. Here, the greenhouse gases absorb heat radiated from Earth’s surface and thus act as a giant insulating blanket.
Greenhouse gases have been building up since the beginning of the industrial age, but only since 1958 has the CO2 content of the atmosphere been measured directly, beginning first on the top of Mauna Loa in Hawai‘i, as described in chapter 4.2 The remarkable Mauna Loa record shows that the amount of atmospheric CO2 has been continuously climbing over the years. In 1958, the average CO2 content of the atmosphere was 315 parts per million (ppm)
by volume (0.0315 percent); by 2015, it had reached about 400 ppm and was rising at a rate of nearly 3 ppm a year. Both the rate of increase and the amount of CO2 presently in the atmosphere are greater than at any time in the past 800,000 years, the time over which the most detailed paleoclimatic record of atmospheric CO2 content exists, and probably much longer.3 Furthermore, a number of observations make quite clear that the CO2 is originating mainly from the burning of fossil fuels.
At the same time, global mean surface air temperature has been rising, too. The warming began around 1910 and has proceeded in two distinct intervals, the first from 1910 to 1940, and the second beginning in the late 1970s and continuing. From 1880 to 2012, global mean surface air temperature increased by 0.85°C (1.53°F), and over the past three decades, the rate of increase has accelerated to 0.27°C (0.49°F) per decade.4
What is causing the warming? The evidence is overwhelming that it is a result of the rising levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. First, there is the basic physics: greenhouse gases absorb radiant heat, or infrared energy, which we know from measurement and observation, and such energy is being emitted from Earth’s surface. As was recognized more than a century ago, the climate therefore should warm as the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases.
Second, there are no other known natural forces external to the climate system that can account for the warming. For instance, some have suggested that changes in the amount of solar irradiance (that is, the amount of sunlight) reaching Earth may be causing the warming rather than the increase in the greenhouse gas content of the atmosphere. There is certainly indirect evidence that irradiance does change with time and that this may explain some of the cool and warm spells in the past. But except for the 11-year sunspot cycle, which represents only a minuscule fluctuation in irradiance, there have been no detectable changes in solar output since the advent of precise measurements by satellite in 1978, yet climate has rapidly warmed since then.5
Internal variations in the climate system—that is, fluctuations occurring on timescales of years to multiple decades and resulting mainly from the system’s dynamic nature—may conceivably account for warming, at least regionally. These variations include phenomena such as ENSO and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO), both of which are oscillatory phenomena in the ocean and atmosphere that result in large-scale redistributions of heat and are discussed fully in chapter 3. However, a variety of observations argue against internal variations as being responsible for the warming.
First, warming has been occurring more or less everywhere—it is a global, not a regional, phenomenon, as would be expected if the warming were due to internal variability.6 Second, the lower atmosphere below about 10 kilometers (33,000 feet) has also been warming, while parts of the upper atmosphere have been cooling, as expected from the basic theory of greenhouse gas warming. Third, both the annual average maximum (daytime) temperature and the annual average minimum (nighttime) temperature have increased, but the nighttime temperature has increased more than the daytime temperature. This observation is consistent with what would be expected from increased insulation by greenhouse gases, as explained in chapter 5. Fourth, the oceans have been warming by far more than can be accounted for by natural internal variations in the climate system.7
Thus CO2 and other greenhouse gases are increasing in the atmosphere, and at the same time, Earth’s climate is warming. The scientific evidence overwhelmingly points to the buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere as the cause of the warming because (1) it is an expectation of the basic physics, (2) it is consistent with all the observations of the present-day climate system and the recent record of climate change, and (3) no one has found an alternative hypothesis that can account for those observations.
Potential Consequences of Climate Change: The Fears
The fears concern how much the planet will warm and what the repercussions may be, but there is much uncertainty about this future. Climate change permeates the entire environment, so numerous effects, ranging from loss of sensitive ecosystems to increased occurrences of extreme weather events, appear likely. But the more profound and more distant potential consequences are those that are more uncertain.
Two potential ramifications that may have a severe impact on society illustrate both the fears and their associated uncertainties. The first and, perhaps, the more frightening is the possibility of harsh and extensive droughts significantly affecting worldwide agriculture and resulting in widespread famine. A number of regions are particularly vulnerable to drought, including western North America, the eastern Mediterranean, Southeast Asia, and the Sahel of Africa (the southern borderland of the Sahara Desert). About 1,000 years ago, for example, western North America experienced a number of “megadroughts,” each of which lasted for several decades over a 300-year interval of relative warmth.8 Such megadroughts have not been seen since. The megadroughts, and the multiyear droughts that have plagued these areas since, appear to be related to conditions in the tropical oceans, but exactly how those conditions influence rainfall patterns is not completely understood. The theory is that warming increases the probability of the occurrence of megadroughts; the fear is that such droughts will occur and have severe economic consequences.9
History is replete with examples of changes in climate that caused localized famine, which, in turn, resulted in massive societal disruptions, including conflict. In today’s world, where trade is global and many economies are intertwined, we might expect localized disruptions to play out differently than in the past. But maybe not. While warming increases the likelihood of drought, it also increases the likelihood that severe and extensive droughts could occur simultaneously in many of the world’s major food-growing regions. Although this may not be likely, especially anytime soon, it is not too difficult to imagine global famine and a cascade of dire and largely unforeseen consequences that follow. History teaches us that this is not an idle concern for the modern world, as demonstrated in chapter 12.
Substantial sea-level rise is the second serious concern. Sea level is currently rising at a rate of 3.2 ± 0.4 millimeters (0.13 inch) a year, equivalent to 32 centimeters (13 inches) a century.10 The main contributions are the melting of glaciers, thermal expansion of the ocean (warm water is less dense than cold water and therefore occupies more space), and loss of ice from the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets. How much or how quickly Greenland and Antarctic ice will disappear is poorly constrained, so the extent of future sea-level rise
is uncertain. This is reflected in the numerous estimates of twenty-first century sea-level rise that range from about 30 to 150 centimeters (1–5 feet).11
The stakes, nonetheless, are high. Worldwide, two-thirds of the cities with populations of more than 5 million people are vulnerable to the effects of rising sea level (the most serious of which are flooding during storms and coastal erosion). A sea-level rise of just 0.5 meter (20 inches) could threaten 10 percent of the world’s population, amounting to some 700 million people, 75 percent of whom live in Asia. The rise will be gradual, but even a 1-meter (40-inch) rise in this century will impose enormous economic costs and possibly also disrupt society in ways that are difficult to foresee.
Thinking About the Future in the Face of Uncertainty
As noted, we know neither exactly how much or how rapidly sea level will rise, nor how drought will affect the global food supply in the distant future. Yes, we are, for the most part, ignorant. But this is exactly the point. We are smart enough to know that we are putting ourselves at risk, but we are not so smart that we can precisely gauge the risk.
Speaking of risk, this concept was invented to deal with an uncertain future. Most of us buy insurance to mitigate risk, such as the personal financial risk associated with a house burning down. We can also buy insurance, in a sense, to alleviate the effects of climate change by adopting policies that seek to minimize the change. But there is a big difference in the two cases: while insurance should allow us to buy a new house, if climate change unleashes globally drastic calamities, unlikely as this might be, we are out of luck because we will not be able to buy a new planet. The important points are that efforts to limit climate change and to mitigate its impacts are exercises in risk management, and that understanding the problem in that light should help guide our response. Again, this perspective is developed in chapter 12.
It is worth pointing out two characteristics of the climate system that further exacerbate the uncertainty of our future. First, the climate system possesses inertia: it takes time for the system to reach a new balance in response to the forces that have acted to change it. In other words, even if greenhouse gas emissions were to be immediately capped at today’s levels, warming would continue for several decades. By one estimate, there is currently more than 0.6°C (1.1°F) worth of warming already locked in, or “in the pipeline,” since the year 2000.12 Second, as the climate changes, it can reach tipping points, or large abrupt shifts in response to the forces that were gradually causing it to change. The geological record is replete with instances of abrupt and dramatic shifts in climate.
On a related note, students often ask us why, considering that climate has changed dramatically in the past in response to only natural forces, we should concern ourselves with human-induced changes. The answers are simple. First, complex societies were not around to experience the huge shifts of the past. The climate of the past 11,600 years, known to geologists as the Holocene, has been stable by the standards of the past 1 million years, and complex societies have been around for only about the past 6,000 of those years. Second, the current human-induced changes are proving to be far more rapid than any natural changes. So the climate system has within it the possibility of bringing about changes that are both
more dramatic and more rapid than societies have ever experienced, and that could challenge their abilities to adapt.
The Story
This book is divided into four parts and takes a somewhat unconventional approach to presenting its subject. Part I is not about climate change; rather, it is about the climate system. The concept of the Earth system, of which the climate system is a part, is fundamental in geological thought, and understanding how the climate system works—in other words, how the components of the climate system interact dynamically and chemically with one another—is a necessary prerequisite to understanding how climate responds to the forces that are acting to change it. Thus Part I recounts the fundamental characteristics of the atmosphere and the ocean, and the ways in which they interact dynamically and chemically with each other through the carbon cycle.
Part II introduces the equally fundamental concept of radiation balance, which is the scientific framework that has emerged for thinking about climate change. Here we describe the many factors that influence radiation balance. We also explore the fascinating story of past climate changes, or paleoclimate, which gives us essential insight into how climate is changing today and how it will change in the future as more greenhouse gases are injected into the atmosphere. The story focuses on the past 3 million years, but we also visit a more distant time to seek additional insight.
Part III concerns the numerous consequences of climate change. It begins by exploring how climate change since the end of the last glaciation has influenced the course of human history. It then documents the rapid increase in global temperature that has occurred over the past century and some of the changes that we are beginning to experience as a consequence of that warming. These include changes in patterns of precipitation and drought and in the occurrence of severe weather events. The Arctic is especially sensitive to warming and, at the same time, has an important influence on global climate, so we also investigate the changes there. As noted, sea-level rise is an important concern, leading us to examine what is happening to the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets.
Part IV is about the future. Although climate models tell us a great deal about the behavior of today’s climate, they are the main means of portraying future climate, and for that reason they are included here. We argued earlier that mitigating climate change is an exercise in risk management, and recognizing this serves as a basis for developing intelligent policies to alleviate the effects. For these reasons, we devote some attention to climate risk. Finally, obviously central to the future is how the world is going to satisfy its insatiable appetite for energy while keeping carbon emissions in check. It is the vastness of the energyproducing enterprise that astonishes, and we take on this subject as the final chapter.
That is the story. It is complex, it suggests that we face a difficult future, but it also implies that we can avoid the most dire consequences of climate change by intelligent action.
Part I THE CLIMATE SYSTEM
The crescent moon as seen through Earth’s thin upper atmosphere
The atmosphere is the medium of climate. It insulates Earth and keeps it warm, transports heat from the tropics to the poles and from the surface to the heights, and transfers water from the oceans to land by precipitation. A crew member of the International Space Station took this photograph from about 360 kilometers (225 miles) above Earth. The cloud deck is about 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) high. (NASA, Johnson Space Center, https://eol.jsc .nasa .gov/SearchPhotos/photo.pl?mission =ISS008&roll =E&frame = 8951)
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A who a knock a Nana gate, bing beng beng?”1
When de boy come, de king say “What you want?” An’ say, “I kill Ballinder Bull, Sir.” Hanansi come out. (King says) “You’s a little liar! Little boy like you couldn’t fight Ballinder Bull!” An’ [115]Hanansi run in, said, “Der is de head!” De boy put his han’ in his pocket said, “Der de tongue an’ de teet’!”
Dey ketch Hanansi an’ ’tretch him out on a ladder, an’ beat him. After dat, dey sen’him to look wood fe de weddin’. Dey sen’ Dog to watch him. Hanansi carried de wood, carry about ten bundle. Ev’ry trip, Dog go wid him. When him come back, ’im say, “Brar Dog, you love meat? I hear one hog over yonder; run go see if we kyan’ get little!” By time Dog return back, Hanansi gwine under wood ’kin an’ hide, an’ all de hunt Dog hunt, kyan’t fin’ him till dis day
In a Brownstown version of the same story, the song is as follows:
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[MP3 ↗ | MusicXML ↗]
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Gashawnee, oh, Gashawnee, oh, Gashawnee, Look how little bit a Sammy call yo’ name why
B A [N ]
Mrs. Ramtalli, Maggotty
There was a bird Arinto; it used to feed on human flesh. In the district there was a little boy by the name of David Lawrence who was lame in both feet. When the boy heard the bird fly, he asked his sister to take him; but she refused, saying if she remained Arinto would eat her too. The boy, having no other resource, dug a hole in the ground where he lived for some time. When the bird came and perched on the house-top, he said, “Smell flesh; somebody about here!” Then David Lawrence sang,
You Arintoe, You Arintoe, Shake, shake, come down to David Lawrence
Then the bird pitched off the house to the spot where he heard the singing. As it was an underground passage, the boy would move along and the bird would follow him up and down. As he went to the foot (of the passage), the bird would go there; as he went above, the bird would go there,—all day like that. At night the bird would go to rest,—couldn’t eat he was so tired. But the boy cooked at night and had his rest.
It went on for some weeks until the bird got tired an’ weary and one night fell off the roost. David Lawrence came out, cut out the tongue, and took it to the king, who had promised whoever killed Arinto would get his daughter’s hand in marriage. Anansi, passing the nex’ day, saw the dead bird, cut off the head and hurried with it to the king. A wedding feast was made to have Anansi married to (the king’s) daughter. Just as that was going on, a ragged boy called at the gate, but Anansi told the king to have nothing to do with him. But he appealed so loudly that the king after all went out, and the boy said to him, “Anansi [116]is a usurper, because, king, have you ever seen a head without a tongue?” Anansi, on hearing that, ran under the table and from there into the house-top. David Lawrence was taken in, dressed, married to the king’s daughter, and lived happily
Jack man dora!
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George Parkes, Mandeville.
Once upon a time a woman had one daughter, an’ that daughter was the prettiest girl in an’ around that country. Every man want the girl to marry, but the mother refuse them as they come. Tiger, too, wanted the girl, an’ demands the girl, an’ the mother says no. Tiger said if he don’t get the girl he will kill her So they remove from that part of the country and go to another part, into a thick wild wood where no one live. And she made a house with a hundred doors and a hundred windows and a large staircase; and the house is an upstairs, an’ there both of them live.
Tiger hear of it, always loafing aroun’ the house to see if he can catch the girl, but the girl never come out. During the day, the mother went to her work, leaving the girl at home. When going out, the mother fasten all the doors an’ windows; coming home in the evening, at a certain spot where she can see the house an’ notice that all the windows an’ doors are close as she leave it, then now she have a song to sing, go like this,—
“Tom Jones, Tom Jones, Tom Jones!”
(that’s the name of the girl). Girl now—
“Deh lo, madame!”
Woman said to her now,
“Fare you well, fare you well, fare you well, Fare you well, me dear; fare you well, me love!
The door don’t open without that song now, and when it open, the mamma go into the house.
At that time, Tiger in the bush listening to the song. So one day while she was away, hear time for her to come home, Tiger approach the spot where she always sing. He now in a very coarse voice sings the song,—
“Tom Jones, Tom Jones, Tom Jones!”
[117]
The girl look from the window, said, “Tiger, a who no know sa’ a you!” So now Tiger go ’way an’ hide till mamma come. When she come, he listen good. Next day, Tiger go to a blacksmith an’ ask de blacksmith what he t’ink can give him, Tiger, a clear v’ice. De blacksmit’ say he must hot a long iron an’ when it hot, mus’ take it push down his t’roat. An’ de blacksmit’ give him a bit of meat to eat after he
burn the throat an’ that will give him a clear v’ice. So Tiger go away eat de meat first an’ den burn de t’roat after. Nex’ day he went to the spot where the woman always sing from. An’that make his v’ice more coarser. He sing now—
“Tom Jones, Tom Jones, Tom Jones!”
The girl look thru the window an’ say, “Cho! a who no know sa’ a you!” So Tiger got vex’ now, an’ he went home, burn the throat first and afterward eat the meat, and that give him a clearer v’ice than the woman. The nex’ day, when most time for the woman to come home from her work, Tiger went to the spot where he can see the house. He begin to sing,
“Tom Jones, Tom Jones, Tom Jones!”
The girl answer (tho’t it was her mother now)—
“Deh la, madame!”
Then Tiger say,
“Fare you well, fare you well, fare you well, Fare you well, me dear; fare you well, me love!
And as the door open, Tiger step up an’ caught the girl an’ swallow her.
And when the mother coming home, reach to the spot and saw the doors and windows open, she throw down what she carry and run to the house. And she saw Tiger lay down. And the mother then went away an’ get some strong men come an’ tie Tiger, kill him, an’open de belly an’ take out de daughter. At that time, little life left in her an’they get back the life in her. The woman then leave the house an’ go off away far into another country, and that is why you always fin’ lot of old houses unoccupied that no one live in. [118]
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a Anansi and Mosquito
George Parkes, Mandeville.
An ol’ lady have a daughter which no one know the name, an she never call the name at all make no one hear it. So she offered a hundred pound to anyone who could tell the girl name. Anansi say he mus’ get that money. Now he went an’ mak a bargain with Mosquito that Mosquito mus’ go in the girl room, as he’s a small man an’ can go thru crevices, an’ he, Anansi will go underneath the mother room. In the night while the girl was sleeping, Mosquito went an’ sing at her ear; an’ the girl then knock her han’ up on Mosquito an’ say, “Go ’way!” At that time the mother stop into her room an’ hear. After a little time, Mosquito went back to the girl ear an’ sing again. The girl knock after him an’ say, “Go ’way!” again. Anansi underneath the mother’s room give a clear listening. A little time after, Mosquito went back to the girl an’ sing at her ear. She then knock after him again an’ say, “Go ’way!” The mother then called to the girl, said, “Zegrady, Zegrady, what’s the matter?”The daughter said, “It is something worrying me in my sleep, mum.” Anansi never wait now for Mosquito, run right to his house, take up his fiddle an’ begin to play,—
“Zegrady, Zegrady, Zegra, Zegrady, Come shake up Anansi hand, My dear!”
The next morning he start for the house and play. So the girl hear her name and say, “Mother, I heard someone call my name!” So the old woman invite Anansi to come in an’ Anansi get the money, never give Mosquito none. So from that day is why Mosquito flying at people ear making noise, because Anansi rob him out of the money.
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b. Anansi plays Baby. (1)
Eliza Barrett, Harmony Hall, Cock-pit country
There was t’ree sister living to a house. Nobody was to know their names. An’ Anansi want to hear them an’ he couldn’t get them. An’ he have a young man an’ turn the young man into a baby (an’ turn himself the baby mother), an’ he carry the baby go an’ ask them if they min’ the baby for her; tell ’em say, when part of the day the baby crying they mus’ bathe the baby for her [119]An’ one of the sister name Santa Cruka. Santa Cruka take the baby an’ ’trip him an’put him into a bowl, an’ Santa Cruka said, “Run come a sister Aminty! ever see such a little baby have such a big man place?” An’ Aminta say, “Run come, Sister Amata! ever see such a little baby have such a big man place?” So when de baby mother come now an’ carry the baby under a tree, the baby tell the mother, “That one name Santa Cruka, an’ the other one name Aminta, an’ the other one name Amata.” An’ he put down the
baby an’ he turn a big tall man before him. An’ he go up to de t’ree lady an’said, “Missus, is not you name Mistress Santa Cruka? An’ she go into her room an’drop down dead. An’ go back to Aminta an’ say, “Sister, is not you right name SisterAminta?” An’ she drop down die. An’ go back to Sister Amata an’ say, “Is not you right name Sister Amata?” An’ (she) drop down dead. An’ (Anansi) take all the richness of the three sisters an’ never care to go home.
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b. Anansi plays baby. (2)
Henry Spence, Bog, Westmoreland.
Anansi go to a groun’. Nobody know dose two sister name, not from dem born. So he come bet dat him will fin’ out dem two sister name. When he come home, he said to his wife him going to fawn himself a baby an’ de wife mus tek job grass-weeding at de groun’ fe dem two women, when him gwine, mus’ put him quite unter de shady tree as a baby. An’ de wife did so. So when de two woman go under de tree, mek much of de baby, nice baby! So as dem woman play wid de baby, de baby laugh, mout’ full of teeth. Two sisters frighten to see young baby have so much teeth. So one of de sister say, “Sister Agumma, run see Anansi baby mout’ full of teet’!” Sister Agumma run come an’ see. Anansi catch dat name. Sister Agumma come say, “O sister Agumma, a-a-ah! Anansi baby mout’ full of teet’ fe true!” Anansi catchy bot’ name an’ win de money
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b. Anansi plays baby. (3)
Richard Morgan, Santa Cruz Mountains.
Der is a man livin’ at a town for eight years, nobody know his name. Hanansi say, “Ma tek off me trousers, put on me long shirt, kyar’ me go a man yard, let him nurse me till you come home from ground.” De baby stay good all de while. When he see h’mudder comin’ home, de baby creep, cryin’, go to his mudder [120]De man went to tek him back, said, “What kind of baby dis count fe, he see he mudder he start to cry?” Meanwhile he go to tek de baby an’ saw de shirt jump up in de back. Him ’toop down, him peep, him knock him han’. “Mercy, me Lord! what kind of a baby got such long hair on him so, poor me, Tom Goody!” Den de baby gwine to his mudder cryin’ “Tommy Goody!” So from dat day, de whole town fin’ out de man dat he name Tommy Goody
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93 A M A [N ]
Thomas White, Maroon Town.
Able have two daughter an’ dey was pretty young women. Anansi hear about dese two women, did want dem for wife, didn’t know what way he was to get dem. Able is a man couldn’t bear to hear no one call him name; for jus’ as he hear him name call, him get disturb all to kill himself. So Anansi get two ripe plantain an’ give de young women de two ripe plantain, an’ dey tek de two ripe plantain from Anansi an’ dey eat de two ripe plantain. Das de only way Anansi can get dese two young women.
An’ Able nebber know ’bout it until one day Mr. Able deh at him house an’ him hear de voice of a singin’,—
“Brar Able o, me ruin1 o Me plant gone!”
= 192
Brar Able say, “Well, from since I born I never know man speak my name in such way!” So he couldn’t stay in de house, an’ come out an’ went to plant sucker-root. Anansi go out,—
“Brar Able o, me ruin o, Me plant gone.”
[121]
Mr. Able went out from de sucker-root an’ he climb breadfruit tree. Anansi go just under de breadfruit tree, sing,
“Brar Able o, me ruin o, Me plant gone.”
[MP3 ↗ | MusicXML ↗]
Brar Able, oh, me ruin, oh, Brar Able, oh, me ruin, oh, Brar Able, oh, me ruin, oh, Brar Able, oh, me plantain gone
Mr. Able went up in a cotton-tree. Anansi went up to de cotton-tree root, give out—
“Brar Able o, me ruin o, Me plant gone.”
An’ Mr. Able tek up himself off de cotton-tree an’ break him neck an’ Mr. Anansi tek charge Mr. Able house an’ two daughters.
Jack man dory, choose one!
Pronounced “roon” ↑
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T K ’ T
Vincent Morrison, Mandeville.
[N ]
Once a king had three daughters and the king die and some young fellows go up to the fence, but as they come they run them. The fellows meet Brar Nansi one day and they said to Anansi, “I bet you never go to that house!” Mr. Anansi said, “I bet you I go up there!”
Anansi went an’ got some horse-mane and get a cotton-tree spar an’ dig out a fiddle.An’ he come out de road de evening, an’ he start to play de fiddle say,
“Tom body tom ting, Tweety tweety tweety tweety tweety twee Linga linga loo
Nobody never go deh yet, Linga linga ling Anansi go deh t’-night A go linga linga ling.”
The ladies call out and ask who is it playing that sweet music. Anansi say, “It’s me, missus!” And the ladies ask who. He says, “Me, Mr. Anansi, missus.” The ladies carry him up to the house and he play for two hours and come away. So the fellows who did bet him, he win them.
Jack man dora!
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George Parkes, Mandeville.
There was once a little child born into a country, born with golden tongue an’ golden teet’, an’ from de day she born, nobody [122]see de teet’ excep’ de mother an’ de father; she never talk for no one to hear her nor to see neither the teeth nor the tongue. Now the king of the country hear of it, an’ he offer a gran’ reward for anyone who would get to make the chil’ talk, because he, the king, never seen a golden tongue an’ teet’ yet. So lot of men went to the house an’ try all sort of mechanic; the chil’ wouldn’t talk.
So Anansi heard off it, went to the king an’ tol’ the king that he would make the chil’ talk; an’ the king say if Anansi make the chil’ talk before him, he will make the reward much larger, but if he don’t make the chil’ talk before him, he, the king, will kill Anansi. So Anansi went away, got his fiddle, cord it up, an’ went to the place of the little chil’; an’ he played on his fiddle to make the chil’ hear,—
“Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do, Merry day t’-day ya, Merry day t’-day ya, Sin do, sin do-o!”
The chil’ look upon Anansi an’ smile; Anansi shake his head. He play the tune again—
“Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do.”
The chil’ laugh; Anansi get to see de teet’. Now Anansi play stronger again de same t’ing,—
“Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do.”
The chil’ begin hum it now,—
“Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do.”
Anansi play again harder now,
“Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do, Merry day t’-day ya, Merry day t’-day ya, Sin do, sin do-o!”
The chil’ make,
“Poly don ya sin do,
Merry day t’-day ya.”
Anansi shake de head an’ laugh an’ he play much stronger now,
“Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do.”
[123]
The chil’ now sing louder,
“Poly don ya sin do! Poly don ya sin do!”
As the chil’ sing that time, Anansi pick up the chil’, run right away to the king palace, call for the king, put the chil’ in the chair, tol’ the king he make the chil’sing, see tongue an’ teet’. The king wouldn’t believe him. Anansi play him fiddle before the king, play the same tune,—
“Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do, Poly don ya sin do, Merry day t’-day ya, Merry day t’-day ya, Merry day t’-day ya, Sin do, sin do-o!”
Chil’ begin now,
“Poly don ya sin do, Merry day t’-day ya!”
And the king was very glad, an’ Anansi was nicely rewarded and the king took the child in his own home, an’ dere she live wid de king forever
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Thomas White, Maroon Town.
Deh was a man name of Goolin. He had a wife. He married him wife fe so many years dat de wife turned dummy,—she couldn’t speak to nobody. An’ Mr. Goolin reward out a certain amount of money, if anyone could make him wife talk, he would pay dem dat amount of money. Anansi hear about it an’ go to take up de job from Mr. Goolin. Anansi says if he had a mountain groun’, an’ Mr. Goolin says yes. An’ Mr. Anansi an’ Mr Goolin go up to de mountain groun’ an’ Mr. Anansi tell Mr. Goolin he mus’ get a coffin made an’ send get up some men to carry de coffin. An’ Mr. Anansi sen’ tell de wife dat Mr. Goolin dead; an’ when de message reach Mrs. Goolin dat her husband dead, Mrs. Goolin commence to cry; an’ when she look an’ see de amount of men goin’ up to de mountain fe gwine carry down Mr. Goolin, de wife was crying but she couldn’t talk.An’ Anansi come down wid Mr. Goolin, an’ dey hev’ to come down a high hill, an’ de house was upon a flat before de hill. Well, Mrs. Goolin da in de house, she hear de great noise was coming down de hill an’ come jus’ at de [124]house door, she come an’ stan’ up an’ look out an’ see de majority of men comin’.Anansi gi’ out,
So Mr. Anansi tek out Mr. Goolin out of de coffin as a live man, an’ Mr. Goolin an’him wife was talking up to t’-day
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a Old Conch
Emanuel Johnson, Brownstown, St. Anne.
There was a king have a lumber to bring into the palace, an’ that lumber was one mile in length and there was not one man could carry it except one old man name of Old Conch. The king sen’ for him; him tek five days to do one mile. Anansi hear, an’ he can walk a little faster than him, an’ went to the king an’ say he will go an’ the king say if he can carry it quicker than Old Conch, he can go. Anansi mek a cotta an’ travel for the lumber, an’ when Old Conch ketch up the five days, fin’ Anansi beside the lumber trying to lift it up and couldn’t lift it. Old Conch were beside the timber an’ commence a song,—
Timber pick up himself an’ mek a leap in two mile.
Anansi went on before an’ stood beside the timber trying to help it on again. Now when Old Conch went up and see Anansi by the timber again, Old Conch go beside the timber an’ say,
“Follow long road, timber, follow!
Follow long road, timber, follow!
Follow long road, timber, follow!
Leap, timber, leap! leap, timber, leap!
Leap, me timber, leap! leap, timber, leap!”
Timber pick up himself mek one jump two more mile; that’s four miles timber gone now Now go on, an’ fin’ Anansi beside it again, an’ start him song say,
“Follow long road, timber, follow!
Follow long road, timber, follow!
Follow long road, timber, follow!
Leap; timber, leap! leap, timber, leap!
Leap, me timber, leap! leap, timber, leap!”
The timber pick up himself two more miles an’ drop in the king yard now.
Then Old Conch go on, an’ Anansi run ahead an’ say, “King, I brought de timber!” King were very glad to see the timber come an’ say, “You done well, Anansi!” an’ say, “I wan’ de timber in dat corner.” Anansi go beside the timber an’ couldn’t fix it in; were trying an’ frying an’ couldn’t fix it in. Now Old Conch come, says, “King, I brought de timber.” King says, “No! Anansi brought it; but, however, I wan’ de timber to go in dat corner, an’ I’ll prove out of de two of you which bring it!” Anansi first go to the timber, an’ couldn’t manage it. Now Old Conch start an’ say,
“Follow long road, timber, follow!
Follow long road, timber, follow!
Follow long road, timber, follow!
Leap, timber, leap! leap, timber, leap!
Leap, me timber, leap! leap, timber, leap!”
The timber pick up himself an’ fall in the corner. Now the king [126]tek after Anansi was to kill him, couldn’t catch him, run under a stone an’ by the time they get up the stone, slip beneath the door crevice!
Jack man dora!
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b. Grass-quit (fragment).
Howard Robinson, Retirement, Cock-pit country
Grass-quit went to the bottom place an’ he haul a little grass-straw an’ tak a knife an’ slit the timberhead like this an’ he fix the grass-straw into it, an’ he say,1
♩ = 88
a) Come, lit-tle tim-ber, fol-low me, hur-rah me a lay.
♩ = 88
b) Come, lit-tle tim-ber, fol-low me, hur-rah me a lay, Big tim-ber, fol-low me, hur-rah me a lay Lit-tle tim-ber, fol-low me, hur-rah me a lay Big tim-ber, fol-low me
An’ the timber follow him right into man yard, an’ as it catch into the yard, the daughter marry Grassquit same time. An’ he sen’ for a police an’ tak up Anansi same time. When Anansi come out of prison, he make Grass-quit ride grass-straw until to-day
The song appears twice in the story, the first time only four measures; it was explained that the second time the song must stop as given because that is how the Anansi Story ends. ↑
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98 T B A [N ]
Richard Morgan, Santa Cruz Mountains.
One boy went to Hanansi yard, an’ Hanansi an’ he mudder made up to kill de boy. Me’while, de boy hear what dem say. Hanansi went away fe one of his country-men help him to kill de boy. As Hanansi gone, de boy kill Hanansi mamma, tek off de coat an’ de sucker, put it on an’ cook up de ol’ lady. When Hanansi come, de ol’ lady gi’ dem deh dinner.An’ he say, “Ma, [127]wha yo’ got stren’t te kill a big big boy?” De boy said, “Yes, me pickney.”—“Ma, a wan’ water.” De ol’ lady gi’ him de water. An’ said, “Lawd, dis fellah fat!” De boy tek time an’ tek off de coat an’ de sucker, t’row it down an’ run, went away. Hanansi tumbled down,—“Lawd! a me mamma been nyam!” An’ run after de boy but couldn’t catch him. So it’s only de boy ever fool Hanansi!
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Moses Hendricks, Mandeville.
There was a wealthy woman, but she had no children. She was always wishful of adopting a child. So she went down to the river to bathe one morning as usual and she saw a pretty baby. She was so glad she took it home and she made a pet of it. She employed a girl called Tamanty to care for the child, and Anansi to be the watchman to watch and see if the girl cared for the child.
So it happened one day she had to go out, so she left them to take care of the child.Anansi wanted all along to get rid of this girl Tamanty. Tamanty was sweeping the house and the little child was playing with the broom. Anansi winked to the girl and said, “Lick him wi’ the broomstick! lick him wi’ the broomstick!” The girl took the broomstick and hit the child. The child started running for the river. Anansi andTamanty started after her, calling out, “Come back, Miss Nancy, come back!” The child said,
“No na no, Tamanty! no na no, Anansi! Me a river craw-fish, me no have a mu-ma, Poor me, river craw-fish! river a me mu-ma.”
The child ran right into the river and became a cray-fish.
[129]
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MODERN EUROPEAN STORIES.
100. A B K . [N ]
Alexander Townsend, Flamstead, St. Andrew.
Ali Baba was the brother of Kissem, but Ali Baba was a poor man and Kissem was a rich man. Ali Baba had two donkeys and an ox,—all his living. Ali Baba was cutting wood one day, he heard a company of horse coming afar. Took his donkeys and hid them in the bush, hid himself in a tree. Forty men were coming on; the head man came right to the cave where he was. Name of the cave was “Sesame.” This cave was shut, would open by the word “Open, Sesame.” And they brought forty bags of gold an’ put in. Shut without word. Ali Baba saw them from the tree-top. When gone, Ali Baba came down to the cave, said, “Open, Sesame, open!” Ali Baba took all the money he could, loaded it on the donkey.
Must measure the money, but didn’t have any measure. Brother said, “What Ali Baba got to measure?” Took stuck the measure. Ali Baba measure, measure, measure, measure thousands of dollars. One piece stuck on the bottom. Brother aska; Ali Baba tells all about it, teaches brother, “Open, Sesame, open.” Next day, Kissem took wagon, oxen, servants, went to the place, said, “Open, Sesame, open!”. When he went inside, cave shut. When he went on, saw all the money, he forgot the word, said, “Open, kem! Open, wem! Open, rim! Open, sim!” Forgot that word entirely, can’t get out. The men came back; “Open, Sesame, open!” Find Kissem. “How came you here?” No answer. Cut Kissem up in five pieces, hung them up in the cave.
Kissem’s wife went to Ali Baba, said, “Kissem no come here yet!” Ali Baba went next day to the place. “Open, Sesame, open!” Finds the five pieces, takes them down, gets a cobbler to sew the five pieces up into a body. Robber comes back, finds body gone. Who took away that body, signifies some one knows the place; must find out who that is.
Goes about town, finds a cobbler [130]who said he joined five pieces into a body. Cobbler shows the house. He gets jars, puts a robber in each jar; one jar has oil. Takes the jars to Ali Baba, says will he buy oil. Ali Baba says yes.
He makes sport for the great governor. Ali Baba had a maid by the name of Margiana, and she was very wittified,—discovered the whole thing, but she didn’t say anything. She danced so well, danced up to the governor to give her something. He put his hand in his pocket to get her something; Margiana get one dagger, killed the governor dead. Margiana got the oil red-hot, poured into all the jars that got men. Ali Baba said, “Well, Margiana, you saved my life and you shall have my son and as much money as you want, and as much money as will put you in heaven!”
