lf;0 LECTURES. 



shape as the hook, and were preserved idih it. But when the hooks came 

 to assume, at first in some hranches of literature, and then quite gener- 

 ally, a smaller sha])e — a quarto and lastly an octavo form, it hecame 

 imj)racticahle to make the ma})s conform to the size of the page. They 

 could not he cut into pieces of any size, like the text of the hook ; 

 hecause it is necessary to give the whole picture at once, in order to 

 exhihit the mutual relation of all its parts. The maps, therefore, as 

 formerly, were ]>rinted in large folio sheets ; hut to fit them for the 

 small hook, it was necessary to fuld them. This folding of the maps, 

 and the consequent necessity which the reader was under of unfolding 

 and folding them up again each time he wished to consult them, was 

 another cause why they were more rapidly destroyed than the books 

 themselves. Here, I have no douht, is the reason why, in so many 

 cases, we possess the hooks, particularly those of the quarto and octavo 

 form, without the old maps. 



I)Ut all these causes of the rapid destruction of maps are only inci- 

 dental. The principal cause of their disappearance lies in the general 

 indifference to those remarkahle ])roducti()ns which has prevailed at 

 all tirfies among the masses of the people. In consequence of this 

 indifference, old maps have not only heen treated with the greatest 

 neglect^ and allowed to perish by accidents, but they have even heen 

 destroyed intentionally. 



To the common eye, old maps are not attractive ; though useful, 

 they scarcely embellish our dwellings, and accordingly have seldom 

 had the advantage of glass and frame, like thousands of less valuable 

 but more ornamental engravings. Hence it ibllon-s, that there are 

 ■wlude periods of the history of art, of which many jiaintings and en- 

 p-ravings have heen preserved to us, even all the cattle and chickens of 

 a Paul Potter, and the rosebuds of a Heemskerk, though such things 

 have b( en repi'esented a hundred times ; while the pictuie of the known 

 world by the hand of Archimedes is wanting, though such a work 

 could be produced but once. 



The natural desire, moreover, of possessing the latest and best map 

 of a country, or of the world, led to that lamentable contempt of old 

 mai)S, which caused them to be discarded as no longer of immediate 

 and |»ractical use, no note being taken of their utility for theoretical 

 purjjoses and for historical research, until quite recent times; even 

 in many topographical and hydrograiihical bureaus they have been 

 •thrown* aside as useless, or to make room tor later productions. This 

 ^was piobably the case already in the times of the Greeks and Romans : 

 eo that when Agathodjemon made better maps than those of his j)re- 

 deccssor, Aristarchus, they ])r(d)ably destroyed the latter; although 

 they never would have thought of knocking to pieces the statues of a 

 IMiidias to give i>lace to the later and more |)erfect works of a Prax- 

 iteles. Hence we cannot attribute to the barbarians exclusively the 

 loss of ancient works in this peculiar branch of art. 



Another great cause of the loss which science has sustained in the 

 article of maps, was the tendency to secrete them, which seems to have 

 T)revaik'd at all times and in all countries. There were always a few 

 persons who set a high value on tlie newest and most correct maps, 

 but who, at the same time, had their reasons for desiring to keep thia 



