171 

 THE USE OF MAPS IN BOTANY. 



W. G. SMITH, Ph.D., 

 University of Leeds. 



The naturalist who ha.s made a fair trial of the use of maps 

 in his rambles will need little argument to convince him of 

 their utility. When feeling- one's way over a new country, a 

 good map is not only a guide as to routes, but also indicates 

 many features which might otherwise be passed unheeded. 

 Whether one goes into the country for pleasure or with some 

 definite object in view, it is surely a matter of general education 

 to know the topographical features, the course and direction of 

 the rivers and streams, and in other ways to absorb on the spot 

 the information which a map can convey. A map may appear 

 at first sight to be matter of fact and uninteresting, yet with the 

 Ordnance Survey sheets as sole companions, one may learn 

 many things about a district as it is to-day, and as it was in 

 days gone by before industry had obliterated natural features, 

 and one may even obtain glimpses of a still earlier period when 

 the Romans and early Britons made their settlements and roads. 

 The value of the information conveyed by the one-inch Ordnance 

 maps, for example, may be appreciated in some degree if one 

 could imagine a large tract of country uncharted. How much 

 information could any of us gather respecting such a district in, 

 say, a year of residence there ? If circumstances demanded that 

 we should try to make a picture of the district, how far should 

 we progress in a year ? Of course, much local knowledge has 

 been gathered by many people who have rarely or never seen a 

 map of their district. There is, however, this diiference between 

 the man who tries to make a map of his own locality and the 

 man who only knows it mentally, that the former leaves docu- 

 ments which may benefit posterity, whereas the latter carries his 

 local knowledge away with him. This is too often the case with 

 local natural history. The few make notes, and in after years 

 the few records actually made are all that the generation 

 of that time has acquired ; the observations made but not 

 recorded are either altogether lost, or the facts are too indefinite 

 to be accepted without re-examination. In reading over the 

 notes of some old observer, one often feels how much more 

 satisfactory it would have been if he had amplified his description 

 in words by calling in the aid of some other method. The 

 preservation of specimens of plants, animals, rocks, and other 

 objects is fundamentally a means of amplifying the written 

 record, since in this way one can refresh one's own memory as 



1906 June I. 



