Januaey 22, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



123 



hardly more than accounts of Mexico by 

 Hill, of California by Perrin Smith, of 

 North Carolina by Cobb ; it is to be noted, 

 moreover, that these three authors are pri- 

 marily geologists, not geographers. This 

 meager showing leads one to suspect that 

 our proceedings do not give a fair measure 

 of geographical activity in North America. 

 There has been in reality a great deal 

 of work of a geographical nature done by 

 our people, but the proceedings of the asso- 

 ciation do not seem to have commended 

 themselves as a place to put the work on 

 record. Our geological surveys, state and 

 national, have contributed numerous geo- 

 graphic chapters and reports of prime 

 value; our weather bureau is in many re- 

 spects the leading institution of its kind; 

 our coast survey sets a high standard for 

 triangulation, coast maps and tide current 

 studies ; we have held a prominent place in 

 arctic exploration, and have taken some 

 part in exploration elsewhere. But in 

 spite of all this accomplishment, we have 

 not made great contributions to the full- 

 fledged science of geography. There are, 

 for example, few steps toward scientific 

 geography of greater value than good 

 maps, but for the geographer to stop with 

 the production of good maps is as if the 

 botanist stopped with the collection of 

 dried plants. The survey reports of our 

 various states and territories contain a 

 great fund of geographical matter, and 

 some of the members of these surveys have 

 carried the physical geography of the 

 lands so far forward as to develop it into 

 a new science, to which a name, geomor- 

 phy or geomorphogeny, has been given; 

 yet geography has not flourished among us 

 as a maturely developed subject. The sur- 

 vey reports have not, as a rule, been pre- 

 pared by persons whose training and inter- 

 ests were primarily geographical, and very 

 few of the geomorphogenists have carried 

 their new science forward into a geograph- 



ical relation; they have usually stopped 

 with the physical aspects of the subject, 

 and left the organic aspects with scanty 

 consideration. It is as if there had been 

 some impediment in the way of the full 

 development of geography as a maturely 

 organized science. There are in fact three 

 serious impediments. 



During all these years geography has 

 suffered greatly from being traditionally 

 a school subject in its educational rela- 

 tions; the subject as a whole has been 

 almost everywhere omitted from the later 

 years of college and university training, 

 although certain of its component parts 

 have received some attention in college 

 years. Again, geography as a whole leads 

 to no professional career outside of school- 

 teaching; it is perhaps chiefly on that ac- 

 count that our colleges and universities can 

 give little time to it. Finally, there is not 

 to-day in this country an organized body 

 of mature geographical experts at all com- 

 parable to the bodies of physicists or of 

 zoologists who are organized into effective 

 working societies; in the absence of such 

 an organization geography suffers greatly 

 for the lack of that aid which comes from 

 mutual encouragement among its workers. 

 How can we remove these impediments of 

 low educational rank, no professional ca- 

 reer and no professional organization? 



Geography will find a place in our col- 

 leges and universities very soon after it is 

 shown to be a subject as worthy of such a 

 place as are the subjects whose position is 

 already assured. Physical geography is 

 to-day slowly winning a more respected 

 place than it has ever had among the sub- 

 jects on which examinations are set for 

 admission to college. Commercial or eco- 

 nomic geography is, I believe, destined to 

 attract increasing attention from mature 

 teachers and nearly mature students. The 

 general geography of various parts of the 

 world must receive more and more consid- 



