Reviews — R. S. Tarr — College Physiography. 83 



The original twenty chapters written hy Professor Tarr deal with 

 the lands and the oceans, while Professor Martin is responsible for 

 one chapter on the ocean and for the whole section dealing with 

 atmospheric phenomena. The bias of the book is certainly towards 

 the geographical and geological side, since out of 814 pages of text 

 636 pages are devoted to the lithosphere. As would naturally be 

 expected, the treatment is distinctively American ; the great majority 

 of the illustrations (of which, by the way, no list is given) are taken 

 from that continent, though other parts of the world, when illustrating 

 special points, are by no means neglected. In a book of this size and 

 comprehensiveness it is difficult and perhaps invidious to single out 

 special portions for criticism, but it may be mentioned that the sections 

 dealing with glaciation in all its forms are particularly good, and will 

 he read with interest by geologists and geographers on this side of the 

 Atlantic. The very detailed study of the glaciation of the United 

 States and Canada carried out in recent years must eventually have 

 an important influence on the final settlement of that much-debated 

 and still unsolved problem, the nature of the Pleistocene glaciation 

 of the British Isles and especially of Eastern and Central England. 



A chapter of great general interest deals with the relief features of 

 the earth's surface, and this is illustrated by an excellent series 

 of photographs of relief-models of the continents; the model of North 

 America, for example, will serve to bring before the student in 

 the clearest manner the threefold division of that continent — the 

 mountain areas in the east and west and the central plain. The 

 picture of the model of Eurasia, however, is much less successful, as 

 it shows Europe only as a minor appendage in a lop-sided position 

 in the north- w r estern corner, and the scale is too small to be of 

 much service. 



Perhaps the least satisfactory portion of the book is that dealing 

 with mountains, and especially the sections describing the mountain 

 systems of Europe. The author's ideas as to the relative ages and 

 mutual relations of the fold-systems of Western Europe are by no 

 means clear, as shown by the following sentence (p. 535): "The 

 low Urals extend north and south along the eastern boundary of 

 Russia, and an ancient mountain range extends from northern 

 Scandinavia through the British Isles to Brittany in France." The 

 second clause gives no clear picture of the relations in time and space 

 of these systems, and certainly does not give an impression of several 

 sets of folds, of very different ages, intersecting at acute angles, 

 as is actually the case. Fig. 340, which is somewhat vaguely 

 labelled " The Alps in Austria, rising above the snow-line", apparently 

 a view of Innsbruck, is scarcely calculated to impart to the intelligent 

 hut untravelled American an adequate idea of the general appearance 

 of a European mountain range. On the. other hand, many of the 

 pictures are very good, taking into account their small size and the 

 fact that they are printed as text-figures. The coloured plates are all 

 well-chosen examples of the beautiful contour-maps issued by the 

 United States Geological Survey, and to each chapter is appended 

 an admirable bibliography. 



E. H. E. 



