360 THE PR0C4RESS OF GEOGRAPHICAL KNOWLEDGE. 



MODEf!N KEQUIREMENTS IN GEO<;ilAPlI10AL MAI' MAKING. 



Yon will ag-ree with me that geography in the aljstract, without 

 illustration — the geography which used to he taught ])y geograph}^ 

 books without maps — is but a poor and ineffieient l)ranch of academic 

 knowledge, hardly worthy even of an infant school. It does not mat- 

 ter what branch of this comprehensive science .you approach, whether 

 it is historical, or i)hysical, or political, modern or ancient, the oidy 

 substantial presentment of the sul)ject to man's understanding is that 

 which has recourse to map illustration. Words (especiall}" words 

 bearing such indefinite applications as our modern geographical termi- 

 nology) can never conve}' to the imagination the same substantial 

 illustration as maps conve}^ to the eye. You may think that all this is 

 mere truism; so it may be; Imt 1 assure you that what I may call 

 descriptive geography — that is to say, geography without the aid of 

 maps, has more than once nearly precipitated national disaster in quite 

 modern times — disaster quite as perilous as any which in military lields 

 has been caused l)y blank, wholeside ignorance of th(^ features of a 

 country in which strategic movements are undertaken. There comes 

 a time in the history of every developing country wlien tlie increase of 

 its people, and the consequent distribution of land, demands surveys 

 for the purposes of fiscal adnnnistration. C'onsecjuently such surveys 

 are connnon everywhere; and from thesc^ have been built up, piece bv 

 piece, like a chikrs puzzle, the ge()gni[)liical maps of many half- 

 occupied lands, illustrating only such portions as are adaptable to 

 economic development, and leaving blank all that promised to l)e 

 unproductive and unprofitai>le. 



FIEED OK (;E0DESY. 



It was only when it was discovered that the sum total of such a pro- 

 duction was apt to cause great confusion in land assessment, inasnmch 

 as it often did not e([ual the actual area of the land distributed, tliat 

 there arose ii school of mathematicians who concerned themselves with 

 determining the dimensions and figure of the earth, and founded that 

 apparently complicated system of primary miq) making which now 

 fakes count of such matters as the cui'vaturc of the earth's surface, the 

 con\-ergency of mci'idians, and other spheroidal problems which aft'ect 

 th(» construction of iho map. 'i'hus arose '"'geodesy," iind ginxli^sv has 

 numbered among its aposth's many of the greatest mathematicians of 

 the age. Geodesy, the science which deals with exact measurements, 

 was never an embodiment of abstract mathematical investigation. 

 It had always a utilitaiian side to it, and if is unfortunate that this 

 view of the science has been occasionally lost sight of in late years. 

 For we have not done with gi^odetic investigation yet. ]\Iagiuticent as 

 are the results obtained by the mathematicians of the past, there are 



