Physical Geography. 127 



Art. XV. — Physical Geography. 

 (Translated from the Bibliotheque Universelle, by Professor Griscom.) 



G. F. ScHouw, Professor of Botany in the University of Copen- 

 hagen, having for several years taught Physical Geography as a dis- 

 tinct science, embracing facts of the highest interest, and which ought 

 not to be separated, as they are in most of the modern treatises of 

 geography, nor connected with those statistical details for which they 

 have no natural affinity and with which they are usually so much en- 

 cumbered, has commenced the publication of his course of lectures, 

 by a work in 4to of 65 pages, with three lithographic plates. He 

 has chosen the Latin as the medium of his communications, — the 

 Danish language not being sufficiently diffused throughout Europe to 

 be generally understood by literary men. In this first specimen of 

 his work, Prof. Schouw has chosen to exhibit a comparison of the 

 three great mountain chains of Europe, — the Alps, the Pyrenees, 

 and the Scandinavian mountains. 



In the preliminary observations, he animadverts upon the method 

 by which Geography is taught, in the numerous abridgments of that 

 science usually employed in schools. " I do not fear to affirm (he 

 remarks) that, paradoxical as the assertion may appear, our abridg- 

 ments of geography do by na means describe the globe, or fulfill 

 what ought to be expected from them, in relation to the science of 

 which they profess to treat." — " The blending of Geography and 

 Statistics is injurious, as it attempts to unite things which are neces- 

 sarily distinct and separates things which have a necessary connec- 

 tion. Thus, the Alpine Region, which certainly forms one whole, 

 is found in the books of geography in various places, under the heads 

 of Switzerland, Italy, France, Germany, Hungary, &;c. ; so that that 

 which forms a great unit cannot be seized at one view, and therefore 

 the recollection of it cannot fail to be confused and imperfect. Spain 

 and Portugal, so closely united by nature, are also separated ; — in 

 treating of Russia, Nova Zembla and the Crimea are taken into the 

 account ; — in describing Denmark, they speak of Iceland, Greenland 

 and the Danish Colonies in Asia, Africa and America ; and thus is 

 produced a most singular confusion of countries and climates, the 

 most diverse and opposite. These defects, in addition to that of in- 

 troducing so much statistical matter that has little or no relation to 

 geography, are such as to prevent the scholar's acquiring from them 

 any just and faithful image of our globe. 



