144 MAPS AND THEIR MAKERS 



leave it with a brief tribute to the work of Cook, Vancouver, 

 Flinders and their colleagues in Pacific, Australian and Ant- 

 arctic waters, and to their successors, Fitzroy, W. F. Owen, 

 P. P. King, Moresby, Nares and other distinguished navi- 

 gators. Upon the work of these men are founded the charts 

 issued by the Hydrographic Department of the Admiralty. 



Two extra-European fields for cartographic work were 

 open to British surveyors in the eighteenth century. North 

 America and the Indian sub-continent, and in both they 

 acquitted themselves creditably, not only paving the way for 

 subsequent advances, but providing the first adequate maps 

 of those areas. For North America, apart from the coasts and 

 the immediate hinterland in the east, only maps based on the 

 rough sketches and reports of explorers were available before 

 the middle of the century. One contemporary cartographer 

 was candid enough to admit that beyond the Great Lakes, the 

 detail was 'in great measure guess work'. The progress of 

 settlement, the organization of the colonies, and particularl); 

 Anglo-French rivalr}^, created a demand for general maps ol 

 greater reliability, and led land surveyors to turn from theii 

 work on estates and plantations and to apply themselves tc 

 the wider problem. In the early years, considerable encourage- 

 ment was given by the Lord Commissioners for Trade and 

 Plantations. Two notable general maps incorporate the results 

 of this activity. In 1749, Lewis Evans published his 'Map 

 of Pensilvania, New- Jersey, New- York', etc., on the scale o] 

 15 miles to 1 inch, based on numerous determinations oi 

 latitude, and two longitudes, those of Philadelphia and Boston 

 To these, he had fitted the 'Draughts and Discoveries', witt 

 which many gentlemen had furnished him. That the map 

 was based in great part on route surveys by distance and bear- 

 ing is shown by his remark "No distance could be taken bul 

 by actual Mensuration (the Woods being yet so thick)", i.e 

 the surveyors were unable to triangulate with the circum- 

 ferentor or early theodolite. Six years later, the map was issued 

 with additions, as the well-known 'General map of the Middle 

 British Colonies, in America'. This map was at once in great 

 demand, and was much used in North America during the 

 Seven Years' War. When he issued a further extended version 



