January 22, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



131 



would be eminently proper for the geolo- 

 gist to make some mention of the present 

 uses to which coal is put ; or for the chem- 

 ist and the botanist to tell something of the 

 geological date when coal was formed, if 

 by so doing the attention of the hearer 

 could be better gained and held, and if the 

 problem at issue could thereby be made 

 clearer and more serviceable. So the geog- 

 rapher is warranted in touching upon the 

 composition, the origin, the exploitation of 

 the Pennsylvania coal-beds, if by so doing 

 he makes a more forcible presentation of 

 his own problem; but if he weakens the 

 presentation of his own problem by the in- 

 troduction of these unessential facts, still 

 more if he presents these unessential facts 

 as his prime interest, he goes too far. The 

 point of all this is that students in many 

 different sciences may have to consider in 

 common certain aspects of the problems 

 presented by the coal of Pennsylvania; 

 but that each student should consider 

 Pennsylvania coal in the way that best 

 serves his own subject. The scrutiny that 

 I have urged would, therefore, be directed 

 chiefly to excluding from consideration 

 under geography the non-geographic rela- 

 tions of the many things that various sci- 

 ences have to study in common, and to 

 bringing forward in geography all the 

 problems that are involved in the relations 

 of the earth and its inhabitants. The 

 things involved in the relations of earth 

 and life are the common property of many 

 sciences, but the relations belong essen- 

 tially to geography. It would be easy to 

 point out topics in text-books and treatises, 

 in the pages of geographical journals and 

 in lectures before geographical societies, 

 that would not fall under any division of 

 geogi'aphy as here defined. In many such 

 cases, however, the topics might without 

 difficulty have been given a sufficiently geo- 

 graphical turn, had it been so desired or 

 intended; the topics might have been pre- 



sented from the geographical point of 

 view, so as to emphasize the essential qual- 

 ity of geographical study, had there been 

 a conscious wish to this end. But in other 

 cases, the subjects presented belong so 

 clearly elsewhere, or are treated so com- 

 pletely from some other than a geograph- 

 ical point of view, as to fall quite outside 

 of geography; for example, a recent num- 

 ber of one of our geographical journals 

 contained an excellent full-page plate and 

 a half page of text on the ' Skull of the 

 Imperial Mammoth,' with brief descrip- 

 tion of its size and anatomy, but with noth- 

 ing more nearly approaching geographical 

 treatment than the statement that the 

 specimen came from ' the sands of western 

 Texas.' In all such cases it is open to 

 question whether close scrutiny as to inclu- 

 sion and exclusion has been given, and 

 while the policy pursued by many geo- 

 graphical societies of generously accepting 

 for their journals many sorts of interest- 

 ing articles has something to commend it 

 in the way of pleasing a mixed constit- 

 uency, it is, nevertheless, open to the objec- 

 tion of not sufficiently advancing the more 

 scientific aspects of geography. Blades of 

 grass and mammoth skulls are very good' 

 things, if crops of hay and collections of 

 fossils are to be gathered; but they are in 

 the way of the growth of the best corn and 

 of the publication of the best geographical 

 journals. Let no one suppose, however, 

 that the audiences in geographical lecture 

 halls or the readers of geographical jour- 

 nals need suffer under the scrutiny that is 

 here urged regarding lectures and articles. 

 There is, even under the strictest scrutiny, 

 an abundance of varied and interesting 

 matter of a strictly geographical nature; 

 few, if any, sciences are richer than geog- 

 raphy in matter of general interest. There 

 is, indeed, some reason for thinking that 

 the real obstacle in the way of applyinar 

 close scrutiny in the way here recom- 



