GEOGRAPHY 



212S 



GEOGRAPHY 



are so widely separated that the animals of one 

 continent apparently have never been able to 

 migrate from the one to the other, at least 

 in recent times. Nevertheless, there seems to 

 be a very marked similarity between many 

 species common to both. The monkeys, lizard 

 species (alligators and crocodiles), antelopes 

 and animals of the cat kind (leopards and 

 jaguars) do not differ very materially. The 

 ostrich of Africa is represented by the rhea in 

 South America; and the species from which 

 have descended the animals of the llama kind 

 in South America are thought to be progenitors 

 of the species from which the camel is de- 

 scended. Such similarities are observed also 

 in North America and Europe, which have 

 many species both of animal life and plant 

 life in common. 



One of the most interesting phases of this 

 animal geography is the subject of migrations, 

 whether of birds or of animals. See BIRD, sub- 

 title Migration oj Birds; ANIMAL, subtitle 

 Migration of Animals. 



Human Geography. In a sense, all the other 

 branches of geography may be considered as 

 leading up to the study of man and his en- 

 vironment, which is so important and has so 

 many divisions that it practically constitutes a 

 science in itself. Anthropogeography it is 

 called, but that apparently difficult word sim- 

 ply means the geography of man. There may 

 be no hemlock trees in the desert, no lions at 

 the North Pole, no sagebrush in the rich bot- 

 tom lands of a river, but there are men almost 

 everywhere, for man is the most adaptable 

 of all living things. It may seem that a desert 

 stretch is too dry to support life; that a 

 swampy region is too unhealthful to be safe; 

 that a mountain range is too steep ever to be 

 accessible; but if once man's ambition is 

 aroused he leads rivers to the arid land, drains 

 the malarial swamp, and scales the lofty moun- 

 tain to establish railroads or to sink his mines 

 into its depths. He can face cold or heat, 

 moisture or drought, but he does not thrive 

 equally everywhere, and in consequence all 

 parts of the earth are not evenly populated. 

 The frigid zones furnish but a scanty living; 

 the tropics take from man his ambitions and 

 his desire to work and leave him lazy and 

 content merely to exist; and it is therefore 

 the temperate zones that people have most 

 thickly settled. Man and the camel are the 

 only animals that, unaided, can cross a desert. 

 The one is educated or trained to overcome the 

 conditions of his environment; that is, he 



"knows how;" the other is physiologically 

 formed for desert life; he is "built that way." 



Then there are the different races of men 

 the black, the red, the brown, the yellow and 

 the white. Is there any special cause for the 

 differences that exist among them? Is there 

 any reason why they live as they do why 

 the Caucasian race did not originate in Africa 

 and the negro in Europe? See RACES OF MEN. 



The subject of occupations, too, is fascinat- 

 ing. Is the principal occupation of a people 

 determined by their character, the geographer 

 asks himself, or does it determine that char- 

 acter? He finds, on careful study, that the 

 two react on each other. Living conditions 

 largely determine occupation, and if a country 

 evolves naturally, there is a regular sequence 

 of activities. First, when settlers are few and 

 land is plenty, herding is likely to be the 

 common pursuit, for each man may have a 

 large acreage on which his stock may graze. 

 But as more people are attracted to the region, 

 each man's holdings become smaller and farm- 

 ing takes the place of pastoral pursuits, for 

 not nearly so much land is necessary for agri- 

 culture as for stock-raising. The time comes, 

 however, when the people become so closely 

 crowded together that the soil cannot support 

 them all, and manufacturing and commerce 

 partly take the place of agriculture. There are, 

 however, other determining factors, particularly 

 climate, topography and mineral content. 

 Temperature and rainfall mark the boundaries 

 of the cotton belt; the inclination of the earth's 

 axis fixes the limits of the corn belt; glacial 

 drift determines the loci of the best wheat 

 lands; coal and water power control the area 

 of manufactures; and harbors and easy trade 

 routes very largely govern commerce. 



Political Geography. Natural conditions, 

 climate, soil, mountains, seas, do not determine 

 all .of geography, for a part of it is man-made. 

 Is there any reason, so far as physical features 

 affect them, why the United States and Canada 

 should be separated just where they are? 

 Would not a far more natural dividing line 

 between two possible countries have been the 

 Rocky Mountains, that great barrier which 

 people hesitated to cross for long years after 

 the eastern part of the continent was settled? 

 The branch of geography which deals with 

 the social activities of the human race, with 

 human governments, with the size and bound- 

 aries of countries and with the location of 

 cities, is called political geography. Very often 

 geographic conditions show the closest con- 



