3 30 The National Geographic Magazine 



who in his Lander tend Vblkerkunde gave 

 the first text-book, or rather hand-book, 

 composed after the new principles ; but 

 more important than this is his Physical 

 Atlas, which down to our times has held 

 a fundamental and leading position in 

 physical geography, and only recently 

 has been imitated in an enlarged size by 

 the great physical atlas which is now 

 being published in lyondon. After Berg- 

 haus, Oscar Peschel became the head 

 and the soul of geographic progress. 

 During more than twenty-five years he 

 edited one of the best geographic peri- 

 odicals, the Aiisland, and his books on 

 Physical Geography, New Problems of 

 Comparative Geography, Ethnology, 

 History of Geograph}^, History of the 

 Age of the Discoveries, though partly 

 supplanted by more recent publications, 

 belong to this class of scientific litera- 

 ture. 



RICHTHOFEN 



A new epoch was opened by Fer- 

 dinand von Richthofen, the explorer 

 of China and Peschel' s successor in the 

 chair of geography at the Universit}^ of 

 lycipzig. The address which he gave at 

 his inauguration in 1883, Uber Aii/gabe7i 

 nnd Metlioden der heutigen Geographie 

 (On the problems and methods of mod- 

 ern geography), became the program of 

 modern geographers, and was indeed the 

 first critical and systematic survey of 

 the whole domain of geography. The 

 program has been changed since in 

 details, as all science undergoes con- 

 stant change and evolution, but it rests 

 to this day upon the foundation he pre- 

 sented. 



In this treatise Richthofen first de- 

 fines the limits of geography, giving 

 as its special field of research the sur- 

 face of the earth. Various are the 

 phenomena which it offers, and which 

 have been studied by various sciences ; 

 but geographical work begins with the 

 problem of location of the different phe- 

 nomena, with the question, Where? 



The surface of the earth may be con- 

 ceived in a double way : as a mathe- 

 matical or a material surface. In the 

 former meaning the geographer's work 

 consists in measuring the earth's extent, 

 which will lead him to define and to 

 represent the relief on maps, and to 

 subordinate the different results of his 

 work to inherent laws, which will build 

 up the morphological side of geogra- 

 phy. Then this surface is also subject ■ 

 to cosmological influences; their inves- 

 tigation will need the assistance of as- 

 tronomy and mathematics, and is called 

 astronomical or mathematical geogra- 

 phy. The material surface is composed 

 of different substances, classed in three 

 grand divisions — atmosphere, hydro- 

 sphere, and lithosphere — each of which 

 consists of various components in various 

 proportions at various times; geography 

 must find out the local relations of the 

 multiple problems and phenomena aris- 

 ing from these combinations. To this 

 end it needs the assistance of meteorol- 

 ogy, hydrology, and geology, without 

 being itself one of these sciences, since 

 it cares for them only for the sake of the 

 consequences which their phenomena 

 produce in the configuration of the sur- 

 face. This is physical geography. 



Buttheearth'ssurfaceisnotarigidone. 

 Itisconstantlyundergoingchangeswhich 

 arise from the different forms of life ex- 

 isting on it, and this obliges the geog- 

 rapher to also take thfe forms of life in 

 consideration. For this he needs the 

 assistance of botany and zoology, which' 

 again furnish him their facts in order 

 that he may stud}^ in them the influ- 

 ence of location, of height, latitude, con- 

 tinental and marine surroundings, etc. 

 These branches of geography are zoog- ' 

 raph}^ and phytogeography. 



At last we must consider the influence 

 of man on all the preceding phenomena, 

 and their influence on him. For this 

 purpose the geographer must consult 

 history, statistics, sociology, ethnology, 

 and anthropology. Out of these investi- 



