Comparative geography

by Carl Ritter

The second class of these sources is the accounts given in the published memoirs of travelers. In more primitive days than these, when very little was known regarding the earth, personal examination was easily completed, with a good degree of fullness, by almost any tourist. With the advance of knowledge, the narratives of travelers have increased, and the sum total of facts observed has become unwieldy; and, where facts have been wanting, the imagination has amply supplied their place. Of course, a single life soon became too short for the personal examination of every quarter of the globe; the narratives of those who had thoroughly explored any one were accepted as authoritative, and these accounts soon became the most generally available of all the sources of geographical knowledge. Yet, with this limitation, that now their abundance and their exactness tend to repress and almost to destroy any personal inquiry whatever. Nothing can take the place of some exploration and investigation on the part of the student of geography.

To the accounts of scientific travelers, may be added those maps and globes which indicate the contour and the vertical elevations and depressions of the earth or its divisions. The demand for perfect accuracy in these is now very great. The map must be a portrait, not a caricature. In its way, the map has a certain dictatorial authority; it is so decisive in its very character, that errors in it are far more dangerous than in the letter-press of books. The English excel in the beauty of their maps: there are none in the world engraved with the rare excellence of theirs; but their care to secure accuracy is not commensurate. The French and the Germans vie for the honor of perfectly transcribing nature.

The Sciences illustrative of Geography.

The sciences which are called in to illustrate the thorough study of geography have largely increased in number within the past few years. They are, for the most part, the same which illustrate history; to which may be added mathematics and natural history. It is a very great mistake to suppose that all that bears upon geography can be crowded within the covers of a single book. It is commonly supposed that geography is a matter of memory. Even in its elementary forms, it is capable of a constructive treatment. Many a teacher, who has not paid special attention to this department, dreams that he can qualify himself by running through a single text-book. No philologist would dream that, with a grammar and dictionary, he could grasp any constructive theory of language. There must first be the study, comparatively, of the great classes. And in geography, the personal study of the earth, with critical closeness, and in the comparative method, is the true way.

Another very common error is, that geography must subsidize what is most striking in other sciences, and thereby gain its charms and attain its uses. Thus geography becomes everything—history, statistics, statecraft, physics, a catalogue of all the possessions of natural history, in all its kingdoms. It takes on all colors, and meanwhile loses its own. It merges all its individuality in other provinces. In no way can it escape this disintegrating force, unless by holding fast to some central principle of being; and that is the relation of all the phenomena and forms of nature to the human race. It cannot exist, if it is to be merely an aggregate of all science, a mosaic of all colors. It is to use the whole circle of sciences to illustrate its own individuality, not to exhibit their peculiarities. It must make them all give a portion, not the whole, and yet must keep itself single and clear.

For the comprehension of mathematical geography, a knowledge of the elements of mathematics and astronomy is indispensable. For determining localities, and for using many needed instruments, there must be some skill in practical astronomy; for measuring distances, for projecting maps and charts, and locating geographical districts upon them, there must be some familiarity with trigonometry and the higher mathematics. No one can thoroughly study geography in foreign lands, and leave all astronomical instruments behind.

Political geography demands an acquaintance with history, and the same helps which the study of history requires. The civil status of no country can be determined without this. Büsching’s “Europe” was a master-piece of its time. But it was impossible for even that book to compress within its covers the whole history of that continent in its relation to the geography of Europe.

The study of Man is, of course, in most intimate alliance with geography. It is only since the opening of this century that ethnography has become a prominent and clearly defined province of science, and enabled to become a great tributary of geography; in fact, the greatest tributary. Other departments are also drawn upon; there can be no close study of the soil, the structure of mountains and plains, without mineralogy and geology. Meteorology, too, the science which discusses the climatic conditions of countries and the effects of climate upon the organization of plants, animals, and man, is of no mean value in illustrating geography. Nor can one be a great geographer who does not understand the flora of the world. Not that he needs to be familiar with the myriads of plants, but the laws of growth and the characteristics of localization must be known. The geographer does not need to repeat in detail where the cereals and the palm-tree thrive. The general conditions which control the growth of plants are all that he has to concern himself with. The main auxiliary for this is furnished in the botanical garden, where the eye sees the products of all localities, arranged, according to their grouping, in the countries where they are indigenous. Botany and zoology and mineralogy are among the sciences most valuable in throwing light upon geography; they display best what wealth each country holds in store for the uses of man; for they are closely connected with the development of industry, the arts, and trade.

This brings us to the last province, commerce, the science of interchange. The study of minerals, of the distribution of plants and animals, is of little advantage, aside from commerce and its uses to man. It is the interchange of the products of one region for those of another which has had, on the whole, the greatest influence on the human race. Think, for an instant, of the transfer of the potato from America to Europe, of maize to Asia; of the far more ancient introduction of wheat and rice from Asia into Europe; and not these alone, but almost all the fruits. Think of the carrying from Asia to America, and, in fact, to all tropical lands, such products as sugar, coffee, and cotton. Think, too, of the results of the search for gold, ivory, and slaves in the interior of Africa, and of gold in California and Australia, opening such immense districts to settlements. The search after platina has disclosed the most guarded recesses of the Cordilleras and the Ural chain; while the need of copper first gave us our complete knowledge of the great system of American lakes. Without the expeditions to secure the whale, the walrus, and the seal, as well as the fur-bearing animals, the polar world would be still untraversed. The discovery of coal on a hundred shores otherwise unknown, led to the settlement of man in colonies from India and China southward to the Antarctic Continent, and northward to Nova Zembla, Spitzbergen, and Greenland.

And not the continents only, seas and oceans have been thoroughly studied, in order to secure a safe pathway for man to the regions which contain his spoils. In the furtherance of this, the highest praise must be awarded to the British government. Through its enterprise and liberality, almost every island group has been examined, a thorough study of marine currents undertaken, careful soundings made in all waters, and a most extensive chartography accomplished. The charts published by the English admiralty already are counted by thousands.