189 



PHYSICAL GKEOGKAPHY OF THE SEA THE 

 ATLANTIC OCEAN.* 



[EDINBUEGH REVIEW, APRIL, 1857.] 



IN the earlier days of this Eeview the teaching of geo- 

 graphy, as then understood and practised amongst us, 

 was a dry and barren task ; tedious to the teacher, distasteful 

 and of slender profit to the scholar. Bald catalogues of 

 easily forgotten names (locorum nuda, nominci, as Pliny 

 calls them), uninformed by science and scantily illustrated 

 by history, formed the staple of the study. Nor was any 

 part of education more defaced by the coarser mechanism of 

 bookmaking. Errors of fact, and even of nomenclature, 

 were perpetuated from one edition or compilation to another ; 

 with little regard to original accuracy, or to the changes going 

 on in the world. And even where some fragment of history 

 or physical science broke in upon the network of names, it 

 was often of doubtful authenticity, or too partial and detached 

 to give real knowledge or gain hold on the memory. This is 

 not an exaggerated view of the manner in which geography 

 was generally taught in England down to a recent period. 

 The more exact study of history had already improved the 



* 1. The Physical Geography of the Sea. By Lieut. Maury, U.S. Navy. 

 London and New York, 1856. 



2. Considerations Generales sur V Ocean Atlantique. Par Philippe de Ker- 

 hallet, Paris, 1853. 



