LECTURES. 131 



foriu the different classes of our map collection after tliem. Before 

 enumerating, however, all the divisions which are thus obtained, it 

 will be proper to determine the order in wliich they should be arranged. 

 America was tirst discovered on its eastern coast, and in its central 

 parts, the Antillian islands. Thence discovery spread to the south 

 and to the north, and after some time reached the western coast. The 

 same direction that was taken by the discoverers was afterwards fol- 

 lowed by settlement and colonization. The march of American history 

 has been a movement from east to west, and from the centre towards 

 the north and south. Upon the whole, therefore, we shall arrange 

 the divisions of our collection in the most natural way, by pursuing 

 a similar order. They will thus succeed one another as follows, viz : 



1, — North America. 



1. The Antilles and Caribbean islands. 



2. Mexico and Central America. 



3. The Atlantic slope and general maps of the United States. 



4. Canada. 



5. The Mississippi valley. 



6. California, or the Pacific slope. 



7. Labrador and Hudson's Bay countries. 



8. The northwest coast of America. 



9. Greenland and the Arctic regions. 

 10. Russian America. 



2. — South America. 



It is evident that this arrangement has its inconveniences. It sepa- 

 rates, for instance, by a great gap the maps of the Antilles and the 

 Caribbean islands from Venezuela, wliich lies in fact so near to them. 

 It separates also the Arctic and Antarctic discoveries, which ap- 

 proach each other in respect to time. But it is the only arrangement 

 which we can come to, and is, I believe, less inconvenient than any 

 other that could be proposed. 



The geographical and political names which we have given to our 

 twenty large subdivisions are, of course, not to be taken as very exact 

 definitions. They must be considered as designating the regions only 

 in a general way. Some of these names, especially the political ones. 



