i894. SOME NEW BOOKS. 309 



question of the mode of development of the limbs, we must be content 

 to wait for the details to be published later ; we can only hope that 

 the delay in issuing the remaining sections of the volume will not be 

 long. 



Geography as it is Taught. 



Philip's Systematic Atlas, Physical and Political, specially designed 

 for the use of Higher Schools and Private Students. Containing over 250 

 maps and diagrams, in 52 plates, with an introduction and index of 12,000 

 names. By E. G. Ravenstein, F.R.G.S. London : George Philip & Son, 1894. 



This astonishing production is, say Messrs. J. Scott Keltie, H. J. Mac- 

 kinder, and E. G. Ravenstein, in a preface, " intended to meet the 

 requirements of pupils in higher schools, of teachers and of other 

 students of geography, for whom neither the ordinary school atlas 

 nor the general reference atlas is entirely adequate." If, then, this 

 atlas represents in any way the methods of teaching favoured by 

 these gentlemen, we are sincerely sorry for any students who come 

 under the hands of Messrs. J. Scott Keltie, H.J. Mackinder, and 

 E. G. Ravenstein. Geography, as certainly Mr. Scott Keltie and 

 Mr. Ravenstein ought to know, is much too important and interesting 

 a science to be distorted and obscured by the wholesale intro- 

 duction of imperfect text-book information from other sciences. 

 There are, for instance, two plates supposed to illustrate the geo- 

 graphical distribution of plants and of animals. On one plate there 

 are eleven separate maps, on the other nineteen, most including at 

 least a hemisphere and illustrating such points as the range of rhubarb, 

 the Cassowary tree, " nut " trees, Wallace's zoogeographical 

 regions, serpents and lizards, the beaver, and the orang-utang, 

 the orders of mammals, and so forth. It is needless to say that it is 

 impossible to give correct information on such a scale, and that the 

 maps as they appear are useless to the zoologist and botanist and 

 pernicious to the general student. There is, again, a "geological" map 

 of Europe on the scale of 637 miles to the inch, coloured to show 

 " Cainozoic and Recent," " Mesozoic," " Palaeozoic," and " Igneous " 

 formations. Two little hemispheres of about three inches diameter 

 show the religions of mankind under the simple if unsatisfactory head- 

 ings " Heathen, Hindu, Bhuddist {sic), Mohammedans, Christians." 

 Two similar maps show the races of mankind — " Aryans, Semites, 

 Hamites, Mongolians, Malays, Hottentots, Negroes, Australians and 

 Papuas, Eskimo, American Indians, Mixed." Do Messrs. Scott Keltie, 

 Mackinder, and Ravenstein regard these tit-bits of inaccurate folly as 

 geography? They certainly are neither geology nor anthropology. 



This desire to crowd in a senseless appearance of information 

 reaches even the topographical plates. Thus in a corner of the plate 

 entitled Great Britain and Ireland is a " map " of London on the scale 

 of three miles to the inch, with the following eight references: — i. 

 Zoological Gardens; 2. Kensington Museum; 3. National Gallery; 

 4. Westminster Abbey ; 5. British Museum ; 6. Law Courts ; 7. St. 

 Paul's Cathedral ; 8. The Tower. For whose benefit is this, and why 

 the invidious exclusion of the Houses of Parliament and Madame 

 Tussaud's ? 



Apart from the singularly incompetent choice of subjects and 

 editing, the plates are clearly printed and, at least by daylight, well 

 coloured. The physical maps are specially useful ; the political 

 maps are up to date ; the maps showing densities of population are 

 of a kind to please those people who like to think they know 



