THE RATIONAL ELEMENT IN GEOGRAPHY 473 



his elementary study and advance toward much broader corre- 

 lations by which the forms of large areas are brought into har- 

 monious association. Systematic geography will thus come to 

 serve the same important object as systematic zoology or botany ; 

 it will provide convenient means of assembling a great body of 

 facts in what is believed to be their natural relations, and it will 

 devise an accurate terminology by which rational and effective 

 description can be given to a vast variety of land forms through 

 their likeness to or difference from many standard types. 



In my own experience, the dominating principle of systematic 

 geography is that of the geographical cycle, of which some ac- 

 count has been given on an early page of this Magazine (vol. i, 

 bS8i), p. 20), and in various later articles, and of which a fuller 

 statement appears in the current number of the (London) Geo- 

 graphical Journal. With increasing experience in its application, 

 the more comprehensive, powerful, and practically useful has 

 the principle of the cycle become. It is now an indispensable 

 guide in observation as well as description, because it leads off 

 a whole procession of facts, marshalling them in good order. 

 From its earliest and most general application to consequent 

 streams, it is now extended to streams of many kinds, systemat- 

 ically acting on one another in the rearrangement of their drain- 

 age areas during their progressive adjustment to the structures 

 on which they work. The cycle accommodates itself easily to 

 the peculiar conditions of arid or frigid climates, and to the spe- 

 cial conditions of the seashore. It stimulates the recognition of 

 real homologies: the rudimentary conception of land drainage 

 as limited to streams of water has thus been expanded so as to 

 include all lines of down-hill movement, whether of water or 

 waste ; and the generalized river is thus seen to cover all the sur- 

 face of its basin. A graded condition or " profile of equilibrium " 

 is first attained by the trunk river on areas of weak rocks and 

 last attained by the creeping waste near the divides on areas of 

 resistant rocks, and the geological theory of evolutionary uni- 

 formitarianism receives new support from the correspondence 

 between the generalizations thus reached and the facts of nature. 

 However theoretical all this may seem to be, I do not believe 

 there is any more practical means of land-form study than is 

 found in the application of the principles here referred to. I 

 earnestly urge teachers of whatever grade to make themselves 

 acquainted with the geographical cycle, and to introduce its ele- 

 ments appropriately in their teaching. 



3'J 



