612 REPORT—1904. 
Section E.—GEOGRAPHY. 
PRESIDENT OF THE SECTION—Doucias W. FResHFIELD, F.R.G.S. 
THURSDAY, AUGUST 18. 
The President delivered the following Address :— 
On Winning and Mankind. 
A GBOGRAPHER or traveller who has been called upon to preside over the meetings 
of our Section of the British Association may be excused for feeling some hesita- 
tion as to the character he shall give to the Address which custom compels him 
to deliver. He cannot but be aware that his audience, while it includes not a few 
experts, probably far better qualified than himself to take the Chair, is composed 
mainly of those whose concern in Geography can only be a general and occasional 
one. 
To compose a summary of the geographical events of the year would bea 
simple and obvious expedient, were I not conscious that in this I have been 
forestalled by the indefatigable President of the Royal Geographical Society. To 
consider the progress of geography, during, say, the last quarter of a century, 
might be instructive to ‘the general.’ On the other hand, on his special subject 
your President may possibly be able to add something to the common stock by way 
of observation or suggestion. 
Bearing in mind the, from the point of view of posterity, almost excessive 
energy with which the nineteenth century carried on the exploration of the globe, 
narrowing in every direction the field left to our explorations and our imaginations, 
1904 may so far be counted as an ‘annus mirabilis’ in the annals of Geography. 
We have seen the successful return, if not as yet to our own shores, to safe seas, 
of the most important expedition ever sent South Polewards. In the success 
obtained by Captain Scott and his comrades, we have welcomed a full justification 
of the course taken in putting the supreme command and direction of the under- 
taking in the hands of an officer of His Majesty’s Navy. ‘ England expects every 
man to do his duty,’ and I will not indulge in hyperbolical praise, which must be 
distasteful to men who have shown in trying circumstances the daring, the 
cheerfulness, and the resourcefulness which we are accustomed to associate with the 
British Navy. We have every reason to expect that the results obtained by the 
energetic and capable men of science attached to the expedition will be of wide 
bearing and interest, but to attempt to estimate them to-day would be obviously 
premature. 
The current year has been distinguished by a, perhaps, even more remarkable 
geographical event. His Majesty’s Government, not satisfied with the laurels it 
has won in the Antarctic, has embarked on a second geographical adventure on a 
larger scale and at a far greater cost (which, however, will presumably be borne 
by India). It has sent forth a Gold Medallist of the Royal Geographical Society, 
Colonel Younghusband, with a numerous escort, to reach the forbidden capital 
of Tibet. The saffron-vested monks on the ‘ golden terraces’ of the Pota La have 
