REVIEWS — GEOGRAPHY OF BRITISH AMERICA. 49 



definite, and if possible, simple and easily remembered name, and 

 hj and by all the rest will follow without labour or difficulty. To 

 tell the child at starting that the Huron Indian is also the Wy-an-dot 

 and the Qa-to-ghie; and that the Chippewa is the Od-jib-wa, the 

 ■ O -jib- way, the Chep-e-wy-an, and the Chip-pe-way, may possibly dis- 

 gust him with the whole subject : it certainly can not render it any 

 clearer to his mind. For nearly similar reasons we conceive that the 

 space devoted to the derivation and significance of Indian topograph- 

 ical nomenclature might be much more usefully employed. Some of 

 the interpretations are certainly wrong, others of them are open to 

 grave doubts ; while the important element, dependent on the essen- 

 tial difierences of the Indian languages from which they are derived, 

 is entirely overlooked. Such philological studies, even if correct, are 

 premature, in such a rudimentary work as this. As we are suggestino- 

 amendments, we may also recommend the summary ejecting from 

 the otherwise appropriate conclusion, that everlasting " Morning 

 Drum" of the Honorable Daniel "Webster, which, however " beauti- 

 ful and impressive" when first heard, begins to grow somewhat weary- 

 some from the hard duty it is made to do in Canadian oratory : " follow- 

 ing the sun, and keeping company with the hours, with one continuous 

 and unbroken strain " of trite grandiloquence. 



We would not, however, wish to dwell on the partial blemishes of a 

 book which we hope to see, not only re-issued in a form altogether 

 satisfactory and acceptable as a most welcome addition to our school 

 literature ; but also made the model for a larger and more compre- 

 hensive work suited for advanced students, and designed to leave a 

 more detailed and consequently a more permanent impression on the 

 mind. In such a work, though Canada may still claim the largest 

 share, it will not occupy it quite so much to the exclusion of other 

 colonies and possessions of the British crown. "Were geography the 

 sole object in view, it would perhaps be legitimate enough to club 

 Gibraltar with Heligoland, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islands, 

 an the minute segment of a concluding page here allotted to the 

 whole ; but for a work bearing on its title page " The Greography and 

 History of the Empire," these themes are rich in historic associations 

 demanding a much larger space. So also with British India, Ceylon, 

 The Cape, Sc. Helena, and Malta, as well as other British dependen- 

 cies, it would be difficult to conceive of subjects more suggestive of 

 useful and attractive study for the beginner, just entering on the 

 threshold of historical investigation. We deprecate, above all things, 

 •the infusion into the youthful minds of our provincial students of a 



VOL, III, D 



