34 Guyot on Carl Bitter. 



In 1816, Bitter went to Berlin, where he remained one 

 year, busily engaged in finishing and putting to press the first 

 edition of his General Geography, the first volume of which was 

 published in that city by Beimer, in 1817, under the title of 

 Die Erdkunde im Verhaltniss zur Natur und zur Geschichte 

 des Menschen, oder Attgemeine Vergleichende Geographic, als 

 sichere Grundelage des Studium und JJnterriclits in physical- 

 ischen und historischen Wissenschaften ; "The Science of 

 the Earth in its relation to Nature and to the History of 

 Man, or General Comparative Geography as a safe foun- 

 dation for studying and teaching Physical and Historical 

 Sciences." In the spring of 1817, he returned to Gcettingen, 

 where he terminated the second volume of the work, which ap- 

 peared in 1818. 



These two volumes comprised only the continents of Africa 

 and Asia, three Books out of twelve, which were to complete 

 the whole work. But they revealed Bitter to the world, and 

 were sufficient to place him in the high scientific position that 

 he has since so successfully sustained, and so usefully occupied. 

 In a masterly Introduction, he unfolds the views which he has 

 so gradually matured, and which are to regenerate geography 

 and to elevate it to the rank of the science of the Globe con- 

 sidered as a living organism. In the work itself, he practical- 

 ly illustrates the method, at once comparative and natural, or 

 objective, as he terms it, which is commended by the lofty 

 stand-point at which he places himself, and from which em- 

 bracing the totality of his subject, he tries to master all its 

 details, to grasp their beautiful arrangement, and to reproduce 

 it in a truthful picture before the eyes of the reader. 



But I beg your permission to leave for a moment all 

 further considerations of that work, the merit and scientific in- 

 fluence of which I shall have soon to discuss, and to say a few 

 more words on Bitter's life and activity subsequent to that 

 important step in his career. 



Bitter's merit was soon appreciated. The year which fol- 

 lowed the publication of the second volume of the "Erdkunde " 

 he received a call as Professor of History in the Gymnasium at 

 Frankfort, which he accepted. In the autumn of the same 

 year he was married, at the age of forty, to the accomplished 

 woman who, for so many years, was the faithful and much 

 beloved companion of his life. 



In 1820, another call, the most honorable that he could 

 receive, brought him to Berlin as Professor of Geography both 

 at the Boyal Military School and at the University, where that 



