Disciplinary Use of pliysiograpliic Study. 159 



ized class of jDhysiographers who sliall assume its particular culti- 

 vation. It is yet rich in unsolved problems and invites the 

 advanced student and the young investigator as well as the ex- 

 pert specialist. In our established educational system there 

 appear to me sufficient grounds in the considerations offered, for 

 urging that this phase of activity should constitute the central 

 training ground in physiography, not to the exclusion of the 

 other departments, but as that basal part of the subject on 

 which the early disciplinary endeavor should be chiefly ex- 

 pended and from which the work of the beginner may proceed 

 to other fields. 



Respecting the place of physiography, the same considerations 

 seem to assign it an intermediate position between geography, 

 as usually introduced, and geology. 



Geography may be said to have for its special function the 

 presentation of the features of the earth as they are ; physiog- 

 raphy has for a part of its special field the study of the physiog- 

 nomy of the earth as an exhibition of agencies and jDrocesses 

 and as a portrayal of the forces that are making and unmaking 

 the face of the land and influencing its inhabitants ; while geology 

 has for its function the revelation of the history and structure 

 of the earth and of the forces that work within as well as with- 

 out it. These are only the salient features. Each has a wider 

 field when given its full compass. 



It is the peculiar province of geology to teach us something of 

 the extent and significance of time. No study ojDens up in like 

 degree the great vista of time and extends and amplifies our 

 conceptions in terms of this fundamental condition of thought. 

 Astronomy performs a like function respecting space. These 

 are the twin expansive studies in terms of time and space. The 

 special function of physiography is to develop our perceptions 

 and conceptions of present surface activities and environment 

 and to give us an intellectual command of the agencies which 

 are constantly engaged in moulding its configuration into that 

 wide variety and expressiveness and that diverse utility which 

 gives to its intellectual and physical reactions upon the human 

 race such scope and potency in the development of human 

 civilization. 



Not the least of my purposes has been to invite attention to 

 the important contributions which recent studies have made to 

 physiographic study, and to the important place it is entitled 



