40 



NATURE 



[September io, 1914 



THE AUSTRALIAN MEETING OF THE 



BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 



SECTION E. 



GEOGRAPHY. 



Opening Address by Sir Charles P. Lucas, 

 K.C.B., K.C.M.G., President of the Section. 



Man as a Geographical Agency. 

 In an inaugural address to the Roval Scottish Geo- 

 erraphical Society on geography and statecraft Lord 

 Milner said : " If I have no right to call myself a 

 geographer, I am at least a firm believer in the value 

 of geographical studies." I wish to echo these words. 

 I have no expert geographical knowledge, and am 

 wholly unversed in science, but I am emboldened to 

 NO. 2341, VOL. 94I 



the larvae of the sequoia pitch-moth {Vespamima 

 sequoiae). According to a leaflet by Mr. J. Brunner, 

 issued as Bulletin No. iii of the U.S. Department 

 of Agriculture, it specially attacks the so-called lodge- 

 pole pine, in which it propagates; other trees in the 

 vicinity of those attacked are endangered by the 

 forest-fires fed by the timber killed by the larvae. 

 Destruction of the larvae themselves seems the only 

 efficient preventive of the infestation. 



Experiments recently undertaken in the United 

 States, as recorded by Mr. B. R. Cond, in vol. ii.. 

 No. 3, of the Journal of Agricultural Research, have 

 shown that the larvae of the boll-weevil (Anthorromus 

 gravelis) can and do feed on plants other than cotton, 

 as, for example, on Hibiscus syriacus. 



The Board of Agriculture has issued a leaflet 

 (No. 286) on the two species of narcissus-flies, Merodon 

 equestris and Eumerus strigatus, the grubs of which 

 attack the bulbs of daffodils and other narcissi. The 

 first and larger species, which was, at one time, 

 supposed to have been introduced from the continent 

 into this country, where it has been recognised since 

 1869, but in the opinion of at least one economic 

 entomologist is probably indigenous, although it only 

 became abundant with the development of daffodil- 

 culture. The second and smaller species is a recent 

 introduction, but, from its destructive nature, is likely 

 to become as serious a pest as the first. The life- 

 history of each species is described, with suggestions 

 for remedial measures. 



The July and August numbers of the Entomologist's 

 Monthly Magazine contain two instalments of an 

 account, by Mr. J. J. Walker, R.N., of the spread 

 of the American butterflv Danaida plexippus to the 

 islands of the south Pacific and Australia. Following 

 one of its^ food-plants — a milk-weed of the genus 

 Asclepias — it appears to have reached Hawaii between 

 1845 ^nd 1850, whence a gravid female (or possibly 

 a pair) was probably carried to Ponape, in the Caro- 

 line group. From this solitary individual (or pair) . 

 have probably sprung the swarms now spread over I 

 the South Sea islands, in many of which this species i 

 is the commonest of all butterflies. \ 



The most important item in Prof. G. H. Car- I 

 penter's report on injurious insects in Ireland during 

 iqi3 (Economic Proc, R. Dublin Soc, vol. ii.. 

 No. 9), relates to the damage caused by the frit-fly 

 (Oscinis frit) to corn crops. This little black fly is 

 a recent introduction to Ireland, and in May and June 

 of last year its maggots were very destructive to a 

 field of oats in Tyrone. Its earlv life-history is de- 

 tailed in an article by Mr. T. R. Hewitt in vol. xiv., 

 No. 23, of ^ the Scientific Proceedings of the Royal 

 Dublin Society; and this account is incorporated in 

 Prof. Carpenter's report. . R. L. 



try to say a few words because of my profound 

 belief in the value of geographical studies. I believe 

 in their value partly on general grounds, and largely 

 because a study of the British Empire leads an 

 Englishman, whether born in England or in Australia, 

 to the inevitable conclusion that statecraft in the past 

 would have been better, if there had been more 

 accurate knowledge of geography. This statement 

 might be illustrated by various anecdotes, some true, 

 not a few apocryphal ; but anecdotes do not lend them- 

 selves to the advancement of science. I am en- 

 couraged, too, to speak because the field of geography 

 is more open to the man in the street than are the 

 sciences more strictly so-called. It is a graphy, not 

 a logy. Geology is the science of the earth. Geo- 

 graphy is a description of the face of the earth and 

 of what is on or under it, a series of pictures with 

 appropriate letterpress and with more or less appro- 

 priate morals to adorn the tale. The man in the street 

 may talk affably and even intelligently about the face 

 of the earth. 



Taking the earth as it is, geographical discovery 

 has well-nigh reached its limit. The truth, in the 

 words of Addison's hymn, is now "spread from Pole 

 to Pole," and recent exploration at the South Pole, 

 with its tale of heroism, will have specially appealed 

 to the citizens of this Southern land. Coasts are in 

 most cases accurately known. The age of Cook and 

 Flinders is past. Interiors are more or less known. 

 In Africa there is no more room for Livingstones, 

 Spekes, Burtons, and Stanleys. In Australia Sir John 

 Forrest is an honoured survival of the exploring age 

 — the age of McDouall Stuart and other heroes of 

 Australian discovery. The old map-makers, in Swift's 

 well-known lines, "o'er unhabitable downs placed 

 elephants for want of towns." Towns have now 

 taken the place of elephants and of kangaroos. 

 Much, no doubt, still remains to be done. The known 

 will be made far better known ; maps will be rectified ; 

 many great inland tracts in Australia and elsewhere 

 will be, as they are now being, scientifically surveyed ; 

 corners of the earth only penetrated now will be swept 

 and garnished. But as we stand to-day, broadly 

 speaking, there are few more lands and seas to 

 conquer. Discovery pure and simple is passing away. 



But meanwhile there is one side of geography 

 which is coming more and more to the front, bringing 

 it more than ever within the scope of the British 

 Association for the Advancement of Science. " Man 

 is the ultimate term in the geographical problem," 

 said Dr. Scott Keltie some years since at the meeting 

 at Toronto. " Geography is a description of the earth 

 as it is, in relation to man," said Sir Clements 

 Markham, long president of the Royal Geographical 

 Society. Geography, I venture to think, is becoming 

 more and more a description of the earth as it is and 

 as it will be under the working hand of man. It is 

 becoming intensive rather than extensive. Geo- 

 graphers have to record, and will more and more 

 have to record, how far man has changed and is 

 changing the face of the earth, to try to predict 

 how far he will change it in the coming centuries. 

 The face of the earth has been unveiled by man. Will 

 the earth save her face in the years before us, and, if 

 she saves her face, will it be taken at face value? 

 How far, for instance, will lines of latitude and longi- 

 tude continue to have any practical meaning? 



Man includes the ordinary man, the settler, the agri- 

 culturist ; man includes, too, the extraordinary — the 

 man of science, the inventor, the engineer. " Man," 

 says a writer on the subject, "is truly a geographical 

 agency," and I ask you to take account of this agency 

 for a few minutes. I do so more especially because 

 one of the chief features of the present day is the rise 



