234 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



method. In the purely empirical presentation, all such terms as delta 

 and volcano must be excluded, because they have more or less sugges- 

 tion of origin, instead of being, like hill and plain, limited to the nam- 

 ing of directly observed facts of form. In the method of thorough- 

 going, conscious, correlated explanation, it is of course not intended 

 that explanation should be insisted upon where no satisfactory explana- 

 tion is found, but that search should be made for explanation every- 

 where, and if it is not found, explicit announcement should be made of 

 failure to find it, and of dissatisfaction with the empirical treatment 

 that is imposed in such cases. 



A regional explanation of the explanatory kind should begin with 

 a leading feature, not necessarily the oldest or the youngest; surely 

 not with minor features; and a concise summary of the region should 

 be presented at the outset, so that the hearers may learn the main 

 theme of the report as soon as possible. For example, in the district of 

 the middle Ehine or of south-central France, the highlands should be 

 at once briefly presented as an uplifted peneplain of deformed structure, 

 with residual elevations (monadnocks) surviving from the cycle in 

 which the peneplain was worn down, and with new valleys eroded dur- 

 ing the new cycle introduced by the uplift. At the same time a map 

 should be used to locate the region under consideration, and a general- 

 ized diagram should serve as the graphic equivalent of the spoken 

 summary: both the map and the diagram should so clearly serve their 

 purpose, that a pointer — an instrument that is often overworked by 

 inexperienced speakers — is hardly necessary. After the first brief, ex- 

 planatory summary, the main facts should be stated again in more 

 amplified form, with fuller explanatory description. Next all details 

 may be at leisure embroidered on the general conception thus developed. 

 If this be done skilfully, the hearers will find no difficulty in giving the 

 proper value to each detail, or in placing it where it belongs. If the 

 regional presentation is then extended to include the organic elements 

 of the landscape, the forests and fields, the villages, roads and indus- 

 tries, may all be easily located in their proper relations to the stage 

 on which the organic drama is played. 



It is, as a rule, a mistake to begin a regional account with an in- 

 ductive enumeration of separate items, which are to be gradually placed 

 in order and given explanatory treatment. Such may have been the 

 order of discovery; but it is not suitable for presentation. Far better 

 is it at once, as above suggested, to plunge into the most comprehen- 

 sive statement possible, so as to give immediately a generalized 

 view of the leading features of the whole region ; but it is here assumed 

 that the audience is as advanced as the speaker, prepared like him for 

 regional discussion by extended inductive and analytical studies, and 

 like him well equipped with an abundance of classified type forms, so 

 that they may easily apprehend the various kinds of forms named by 



