June i6. 1910] 



NA TURF 



453 



visited the West Indies to investigate this problem, 

 and, in spite of the nature of the lavas, felt bound to 

 reject the conclusion owing to the palaeontological and 

 tectonic evidence. 



South America itself, according to Prof. Suess's 

 interpretation, has a uniform structure without any 

 trace of the earlier geographical plans which he 

 admits in other continents. The mountains trending 

 from north-west to south-east in the Argentine he 

 explains as connected with the Andes, an opinion 

 different from that of some Argentine geologists; and 

 as it is conceded that the Sierra de Tandil does not 

 belong to the Andes, there seems evidence for the 

 existence of an older mountain system. 



The English translation has been issued as vol. iv. , 

 without the plates, maps, appendices, and index, 

 which are to follow. The translation shows evidence 

 of haste, and it has missed the revision by several 

 distinguished geologists of which the preceding 

 volume had the benefit. Miss SoUas has done her 

 part of the work well, as the translation reads easily ; 

 but in a work of such geographical importance it is 

 a pity that the geographical terms were not more 

 carefully revised. Thus the depressions on the 

 oceanic floors known in German as *' Rinnen " are 

 translated as "channels" (p. 294), a term which con- 

 notes the idea of flow, so that the term "trench," 

 recommended by the International Geographical Con- 

 gress, is preferable. "Die Stauung der ersten Welle" 

 (p. 438) is translated (p. 382) as " the stowing of the 

 first wave," whatever that may mean. More serious 

 objection can be taken to the translation of " Das 

 Zwischen Gebirge," in which Prof. Suess includes all 

 the mountains in Canada and the United States west 

 jof the Rockies with the exception of the Mount St. 

 Elias chain, as the Intermediate " Range." The term 

 .range is so unsuitable to a vast area of mountain 

 countrv-, which includes many mountain ranges, that 

 the translation cannot always adopt it ; so when Prof. 

 Suess says (p. 479), " Das Zwischengebirge in ein 

 Meer von submeridionalen Zugen aufgelost," the 

 English version reads, "The Intermediate Chain, 

 broken up into a sea of submeridional ranges." 

 As an illustration of the inconsistency in the trans- 

 .';lation of geographical terms, it may be remarked 

 that Gebirge, Ziig, and Kette are all sometimes trans- 

 lated as range; while Gebirge and Kette are also both 

 sometimes translated as chain. British students will 

 find the irregular treatment of place-names incon- 

 venient and puzzling. Such variations as Brazilia and 

 Brasilia are unimportant, though hardly to be ex- 

 jpected in a work issued by a University Press; but 

 imany of the variations introduced are confusing. 

 ..Thus, Prof. Suess speaks of the Sea of Ochot'sch, 

 jand calls some adjacent mountains the Ochitiden. 

 .'The translation, by adopting Okhotsk (p. 328) for 

 ;the sea and Ochotides for the mountains, obscures 

 jtheir connection ; the latter name is once spelt Okho- 

 .jtides. The Yana of p. 331 is the Jana of p. 332; and 

 ■ ithe Chuchki Peninsula of p. 358 is the Chukchi of 

 > P* 377- The Chaja of Suess is sometimes repeated 

 ...in that form (p. 334), sometimes as Khaja (p. 335), 

 ...and as Chaya (p. 337). Kegyl (p. 334) is Kvgyfon 

 W- 339- 



NO. 2120, VOL. 83] 



Many of the names in the translation appear in 

 German forms, and are difficult to find in British 

 atlases; thus the lake, w-hich in the Times atlas 

 appears as Yege — a reasonable transliteration — is spelt 

 Eche or Esse. Yezo appears as Hokkaido, and Gilolo 

 as Halmahera. The Vistula is mentioned thrice, but 

 its identit\' is each time concealed by the retention of 

 its German name, Weichsel ; " from the Weichsel to 

 Dakota " (p. 88) does not give much information to 

 a student limited to British atlases or gazetteers. 

 Further confusion is added by the differences between 

 the text and the figures ; thus Werchne in Fig. 28 is 

 the Verkhne of the text, and Werchojanskij in the 

 same figure occurs as Verkhoiansk in the text. 



In the French edition the original technical terms 

 are often quoted in brackets after the translation, and 

 as that excellent precedent has not been followed it 

 w'ould be convenient if, in the index-volume, a list 

 were given of Prof. Suess's geographical terms with 

 the translations adopted. J. W. Gregory. 



EXPLORATIONS OF INDIA. 

 The Gates of India. Being an Historical Narrative. 

 By Colonel Sir Thomas Holdich, K.C.M.G. Pp. 

 XV + 555. (London : Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 

 1910.) Price 105. net. 



THESE " Gates of India " are the gates beyond 

 the Indus, the difficult tracks through which 

 all the great historic invaders of the country' made 

 their way prior to the days of oceanic exploration. 

 There are few men more competent to write about 

 them than Sir Thomas Holdich, who knows them 

 from the Pamirs to Makran, though he hardly refers 

 to his own achievements as a geographer, but treats 

 the matter mainly from the historic standpoint, begin- 

 ning with the Medes and Persians, and ending with 

 Pottinger and Burnes and their contemporaries. 



For the purposes of review we may divide the book 

 into three parts. The first part — a quarter of the 

 whole — deals mainly with what may be called the 

 conjectural period of Assyrian and Persian and Greek. 

 The second part — another quarter — is taken up by 

 the Arabs ; here the observer, describing country as 

 wonderful as it is inaccessible to ordinary people, 

 keeps conjecture subordinate to facts of observation. 

 The third part, occupying riearly half the book, 

 reviews the explorations and adventures of the modern 

 European period; here facts predominate, and the 

 romance of the story is of an individual kind. 



We propose to give precedence to the second or 

 Arab period, as this part of the book is the most 

 original and certainly the most novel. 



Everyone, of course, know-s in a general way that 

 Arab merchants and slave-dealers went ever^'where — • 

 their footprints have been left all over Africa ; Algerian 

 slave-hunters even raided the coasts of Iceland once 

 upon a time — but amid the alarums and excursions 

 of historians and archaeologists intent on Macedonian 

 and Mogul invaders and Buddhist monuments, most 

 people nowadays need to be told that " the whole of 

 the Indian north-west frontier was much traversed by 

 and thoroughly well known to the Arab trader." 



Sir Thomas Holdich has much to sav about these 



