4o8 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XIV. No. 35S 



derived. The belief, accordingly, that pre-Mohammedan Arabia 

 was a land of illiterate nomads, must be abandoned : it was not 

 Islam that introduced writing into it, but the princes and merchants 

 of Ma'in and Thamud, centuries upon centuries before. If Mo- 

 hammedan Arabia knew nothing of its past, it was not because the 

 past had left no records behind it. 



A power which reached to the borders of Palestine must neces- 

 sarily have come into contact with the great monarchies of the 

 ancient world. The army of ^lius Gallus was doubtless not the 

 first which had sought to gain possession of the cities and spice- 

 gardens of the south. One such invasion is alluded to in an inscrip- 

 tion which was copied by M. Halevy. The inscription belongs to 

 the closing days of the Minsean kingdom, and after describing how 

 the gods had delivered its dedicators from a raiding attack on the 

 part of the tribes of Saba and Khaulan, or Havilah, goes on to 

 speak of their further deliverance from danger in " the midst of 

 Misr," or Egypt, when there was war between the latter country 

 and the land of Mazi, which Dr. Glaser would identify with the 

 Edomite tribe of Mizzah (Gen. .xxxvi. 13). There was yet a third 

 occasion, however, on which the dedicators had been rescued by 

 their deities 'Athtar, Wadd, and Nikrahh : this was when war had 

 broken out between the rulers of the south and of the north. If 

 the rulers of the south were the princes of Ma'in, whose power ex- 

 tended to Gaza, the rulers of the north ought to be found in Egypt 

 or Palestine. Future research may tell us who they were and 

 when they lived. 



But the epigraphy of ancient Arabia is still in its infancy. The 

 inscriptions already known to us represent but a small proportion 

 of those that are yet to be discovered. Vast tracts have never yet 

 been traversed by the foot of an explorer, and there are ancient 

 ruins which have never yet been seen by the eye of the European 

 What has been accomplished already with the scanty means still 

 at our disposal is an earnest of what remains to be done. The 

 dark past of the Arabian peninsula has been suddenly lighted up ; 

 and we find that long before the days of Mohammed it was a land 

 of culture and literature, a seat of powerful kingdoms and wealthy 

 commerce, which cannot fail to have exercised an influence upon 

 the general history of the world. A. H. Sayce. 



MR. MACKINDER ON GEOGRAPHY-TEACHING. 



The reader in geography in the University of Oxford has been 

 delivering a course of four lectures at the English College of Pre- 

 ceptors. The introductory lecture was given on Nov. 8, before a 

 crowded audience, consisting mainly of women teachers. 



We must first settle, said Mr. Mackinder (as given in the London 

 Jour?ial of Education of recent date), what are our aims in geographi- 

 cal teaching, else we shall be like men blindfold, trying to find their 

 way out of a field with but one gate. If we succeed, it will be by 

 a dcia TvxT]' AH teaching aims at discipline, or information, or 

 both. Geography, as hitherto taught, has aimed solely at informa- 

 tion. Even the leading authorities have supported this view. 

 Thus a general, a distinguished member of the Geographical So- 

 ciety, lately complained to the lecturer of the brutal ignorance dis- 

 played by society in general, because at a large dinner-party his 

 wife was the only guest who knew where Nassau, New Providence, 

 was. Such geographical lore the lecturer said he heartily despised. 

 It might have been of use before the invention of gazetteers : now 

 it is utterly useless. Yet some geographical information is worth 

 having, though discipline is the main thing. Thus the question 

 turns up, " Where is Allahabad.'" A reference to the gazetteer 

 will tell us, " Allahabad is the capital of the North- West Provinces 

 of India, situate at the junction of the Jumna and the Ganges." 

 To the uneducated person these statements will convey nothing 

 more than the vague impression that Allahabad is somewhere in 

 the north of India. One who has been trained in geography will 

 at once picture to himself the centre of a great and populous prov- 

 ince, standing in the great plain which lies at the foot of the 

 Himalayas. If the teacher has thus given a skeleton into v/hich 

 details may be fitted, he has not merely supplied information, but 

 also developed capacity. Acquaintance with great facts, vividly 

 and familiarly known, so that they are part and parcel of the mind's 



furniture, is indeed discipline ; for it involves the grasping of con- 

 trasts, analysis, learning to deal with ideas. 



The basis of geography-teaching must undoubtedly be Heimats- 

 kunde (" knowledge of the pupil's home and surroundings ") ; but 

 this sound pedagogic principle has of late been pressed to the 

 verge of absurdity. Professor Geikie, in " The Teaching of 

 Geography," went so far as to leave all the geography out, and 

 teach every thing else under the sun. We are told that the pro- 

 fessor must teach his class the homologies of the limbs of animals^ 

 and the various styles of architecture. Such general knowledge is 

 most valuable, but there is a danger of not seeing the wood for the 

 trees. In the same way, if the reform advocated for elementary 

 schools to combine geography and natural science were carried, 

 geography would be pretty certain to go to the wall. True, geog- 

 raphy, with one exception, is a late subject, and must be based on 

 physiography ; but it is best to keep the two names separate, 

 " Physiography " is an old term, brought into fashion again by Pro- 

 fessor Huxley. The Science and Art Department has just given 

 it a more extended meaning than it bears in Professor Huxley's 

 book with that title, and includes under its astronomical phenomena 

 the laws of gravitation, etc. Such physiography we do not need 

 as a preparation for geography. All a child need know is the 

 meaning of the common world around him, the air he breathes, 

 the water he drinks, ice, snow, rain, clouds. These facts of com- 

 mon life might be imparted at a very early age, and were best im- 

 parted by parents. At present parents are too ignorant to teach 

 them, and they must be ^taught first at school. The exception 

 above referred to is the instilling of those rudimentary facts which 

 are to geography what the multiplication-table is to arithmetic. 

 Without these facts, such as the outlines of continents and oceans, 

 which cannot be taught inductively, no comparison, no generaliza- 

 tion, is possible ; and if they are to be indelibly impressed on the 

 mind, and form part of the groundwork, they must be learned very 

 early. The why of geography cannot come till considerable por- 

 tions of history and science have been answered. These outlines, 

 our multiplication-table, must be taught by maps : they are purely 

 a question of eye-memory. We want neither maps full of details 

 (the old error), nor a single map of a country with only twenty 

 names in it (the modern error), but a number of maps, each one 

 accentuating some single feature, and showing the country in some 

 new connection. Such maps could be produced very cheaply, and 

 we might have a whole series of them. Even grown-up people 

 rarely know the look of a country except in one connection, and 

 are unable, in turning over an atlas, to recognize a map at a glance 

 without the help of the name in the corner. So, in map-drawing, 

 we require far too great elaboration. What we want is, to enable 

 a child to reproduce from^'memory a rapid outline of Italy as a 

 peninsula of south-western Europe, again as part of the Mediter- 

 ranean coast-line, and so on. The old school of teachers, who in- 

 sist on lists of names by heart, argue that "we are bound to train 

 the memory," and that " the memory is strongest in the young." 

 They do not perceive that they are arguing in a vicious circle. If 

 the memory is strong, what need to cultivate it specially } What 

 is needed is to supply it with facts worth remembering. " Give 

 plenty of facts, and some are sure to stick." " Granted," replied 

 the lecturer, " but these are likely to be the least important. From 

 my school lessons on the geography of Italy, I retain the one fact 

 that twelve miles north of Milan there is a village famous for its 

 cheese-making." 



Text-books are useful as a guide to the teacher, and as a record 

 of what has been taught to the pupil. The old way of using 

 them — " Get up the next three pages ; now shut your books ; 

 name the departments of France and their capitals " — is a parody 

 of teaching. Nor is the modern fashion of lecturing, by itself, 

 much better. A lecturer can stimulate and direct study : he can- 

 not supply accurate information ; he cannot educe knowledge or 

 test its soundness. 



Teachers, by blindly following text-books, fall into the vicious 

 method of taking one country at a time. They should go over the 

 same ground again and again, each time in a new connection, 

 showing the physical, commercial, poUtical connection of one coun- 

 try with other countries. For this we need variety of apparatus, — 

 maps, sections, models, views, magic-lantern slides, and, above all. 



