GEOGRAPHY AND EVOLUTION. 



193 



but comparatively a very small area with the essential features of 

 which we are not now fairly well acquainted. Day by day our maps 

 become more complete, and with our greatly-improved means of com- 

 munication the knowledge of distant countries is constantly enlarged 

 and more widely diifused. Somewhat in the same proportion the de- 

 mands for more exact information become more pressing. The neces- 

 sary consequence is an increased tendency to give to geographical in- 

 vestigations a more strictly scientific direction. In proof of this I 

 may instance the fact that the two British naval expeditions now 

 being carried on, that of the Challenger and that of the arctic seas, 

 have been organized almost entirely for general scientific research, 

 and comparatively little for topographical discovery. Narratives of 

 travels, which not many years ago might have been accepted as valu- 

 able contributions to our then less perfect knowledge, would now per- 

 haps be regarded as superficial and insufficient. In short, the stand- 

 ard of knowledge of travelers and writers on geography must be raised 

 to meet the increased requirements of the time. 



Other influences are at work tending to the same result. The 

 great advance made in all branches of natural science limits more and 

 more closely the facilities for original research, and drawls the ob- 

 server of Nature into more and more special studies, while it renders 

 the acquisition by any individual of the highest standard of knowledge 

 in more than one or two special subjects comparatively difficult and 

 rare. At the same time the mutual interdependence of all natural 

 phenomena daily becomes more apparent ; and it is of ever-increasing 

 importance that there shall be some among the cultivators of natural 

 knowledge who specially direct their attention to the general relations 

 existing among all the forces and phenomena of Nature. In some im- 

 portant branches of such subjects, it is only through study of the local 

 physical conditions of various parts of the earth's surface and the com- 

 plicated phenomena to which they give rise that sound conclusions 

 can be established ; and this study constitutes physical or scientific 

 geography. It is very necessary to bear in mind that a large portion 

 of the phenomena dealt with by the sciences of observation relates to 

 the earth as a whole in contradistinction to the substances of which it 

 is formed, and can only be correctly appreciated in connection with 

 the terrestrial or geographical conditions of the place where they 

 occur. On the one hand, therefore, while the proper prosecution of 

 the study of physical geography requires a sound knowledge of the 

 researches and conclusions of students in the special branches of sci- 

 ence, on the other, success is not attainable in the special branches 

 without suitable apprehension of geographical facts. For these rea- 

 sons it appears to me that the general progress of science will involve 

 the study of geography in a more scientific spirit, and with a clearer 

 conception of its true function, which is that of obtaining accurate 

 notions of the manner in Avhich the forces of Nature have brought 



VOL. VIII. 13 



