OCTOBEB 9, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



457 



sequence of that structiue. Indeed the 

 reading of a good geological map to the 

 geologist is like the reading of a score by 

 a musician. 



Surely it would be most unwise if the 

 Committee on ^Military Education were to 

 cut out of their curriculum the one subject 

 which has exercised and educated this 

 faculty, and one which is at the same time 

 doing a great deal to counteract that de- 

 generation of observing faculties insepar- 

 able from a town life. Some cadets at 

 least ought to be chosen from amongst 

 those men who have been trained by this 

 method to see quickly and accurately inco 

 the topographic character and possibilities 

 of a country, and provision should be 

 made for educating their faculties further 

 until they become of genuine strategic 

 value. 



Then I believe it would be correct to say 

 that no class of men get to know their own 

 country with anything like the minuteness 

 and accuracy of the geological surveyor. 

 The mere topographer simply transfers his 

 impressions on the spot as quickly as may 

 be to paper, and has no further concern 

 with them. The geologist must keep them 

 stored in his mind, watching the variation 

 and development of each feature from 

 point to point for his own purposes. He 

 must traverse every inch of his ground, he 

 must know where he can climb each moun- 

 tain and ford every brook, where there are 

 quarries or roads, springs or flats; what 

 can be seen from every point of view, how 

 the habitability or habitations vary from 

 point to point ; in short, he must become a 

 veritable walking map of his own district. 

 Why not scatter such men in every quarter 

 of the globe, particularly where any trouble 

 is likely to arise ? They are cheap enough, 

 they will waste no time, and they will be 

 so glad of the chance for research that they 

 will not be hard to satisfv in the matter of 



pay and equipment. Thus you will acquire 

 a corps of guides, ready wherever and 

 whenever they are wanted; and when 

 trouble arises they may do a great deal by 

 means of their minute knowledge of to- 

 pography to save millions of money and 

 thousands of lives, and to prevent the irri- 

 tating recurrence of the kind of disaster 

 with which we have become sadly familiar 

 within the last five years. 



In dealing with the relationship of 

 geology to geography geologists are fre- 

 quently charged with claiming too much. 

 On this point at least, however, there can 

 be no difference of opinion, that the 

 majority of geological surveyors and un- 

 ofiScial investigators have kept their eyes 

 open to this relationship, and have often 

 contributed new explanations to old prob- 

 lems. They have been compelled to observe, 

 and often to explain, surface features be- 

 fore making use of them in their own map- 

 ping, and in doing so have often hit upon 

 new principles. It is hardly needful to 

 mention such examples as Ramsay's great 

 conception of plains of marine denudation, 

 Whitaker's convincing memoir on sub- 

 aerial denudation. Jukes 's explanation of 

 the laws of river adjustment, Gilbert's 

 scientific essay on erosion, Heim's demon- 

 stration of the share taken by earth move- 

 ment in the modeling of landscape features, 

 and the exceedingly valuable proofs of the 

 relation of human settlement and move- 

 ment to underground structure, worked 

 out with such skill and diligence by Topley 

 in his masterly memoir on the Weald — 

 the jumping-oft" place, if I may so term it, 

 of the new geography. 



No one is more pleased than geologists 

 that geographers have ceased to di-aw their 

 knowledge of causation solely from history, 

 and that they have turned their attention 

 to the dependence and reaction of man- 

 kind on nature as well. But while hoping 



