AMERICAN SCHOOL GEOGRAPHY, EMBRACING A GENERAL VIEW OF MATHEMATICAL, PHYSICAL, AND CIVIL GEOGRAPHY, ADAPTED TO THE CAPACITIES OF CHILDREN. WITH AN ATLAS. BY BARNUM FIELD, A. M. FOURTEENTH EDITION. C BOSTON: OTIS, BROADERS, AND COMPANY. 1844. At a meeting of the School Committee of the City of Ordered, That the American School Geography, by Barnum Field, be used in the public Schools, and that the several masters be authorised to introduce said book. Extract from the records of the School Committee. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1831, by in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts. BOUND APR 23 1914 PREFACE. The design of Geography, is to give us a knowledge of the Earth. Most authors have extended the subject beyond its proper limits. After several years' experience in the business of teaching, I have been convinced that much improvement might be made in this branch of instruction; and, that all which is in any way necessary that a school book on this subject should contain, might be presented in a more attractive form and better adapted to the capacities of children. It is believed that there has been a great mistake concerning what is important and practicable for children to learn. Teachers have found that a minuteness of detail and description tends more to confuse than to inform the pupil. To describe, for example, as many surfaces and climates as there are States and Territories in this country, with the like exactness on other unimportant matters, can tend but little to elevate the mind. This exactness is often required of the learner respecting the characteristics and localities of some of the smallest places in his own country and in foreign countries. There can be but little advantage in the exercise of learning such facts, while the information is as unimportant as a knowledge of the mineralogy of the frigid zones. A difficulty, in most text books, on this subject, is the blending of objects, which should be kept distinct. We often find, on the same page, subjects peculiar to the whole of Mathematical, Physical and Civil Geography; and if the author's directions be |