Cape and head are merely the same name in two dif ferent languages; but we are not at all sure that they are used with much precision. The word cape is certainly applied both to low and high land projecting into the ocean; but it is clearly desirable to have distinct names for these different kinds of projections. Nose,

naze, or ness, is not uncommon in England; but frequent in Scotland, and we find it also in Denmark : we have in England Sheerness, Dungeness, the Naze, &c. All these terms perhaps would come under some of the more general denominations of promontory, or capes, if they were well defined. It would not appear very difficult to divide the different projections of land into the sea into classes, according to some one, two, or more characteristics; it might be desirable to retain the usual names of cape, &c., adding to them a distinctive term by which each would be referred to its proper class.

As to mountains, the difficulty is great, for nothing is so indefinite as the word mountain. Elevations which are only hills in one country are mountains in another; and even in the same country the point at which a hill becomes a mountain is always a little uncertain. The remedy for this is to have geographically only one name to indicate all elevation; the altitude of each would be one element by which its more specific character would be determined. Next to elevation, the shape of mountains or of high land requires consideration. Land may be elevated and yet flat; there may be an ascent to it on one side, which looks like the slope of a hill or a mountain; but on ascending to the top of the slope we may find an extensive level, declining so imperceptibly as to convey no other idea than that of a great plain. Or a mountain may have two opposite

slopes of different inclination, with what is called its summit consisting of a level plain. Such a level is found on one of the summits of Olympus in Asia Minor, and indeed they exist in all hilly countries. Hence in connexion with elevations of the earth's surface we have various kinds of plains: we have river-plains, hillplains, mountain-plains (ópoñédia, Strabo), and, no doubt, other kinds of plains. We by no means despair of seeing names given to these different kinds of flat lands, which will be favourably received and adopted. The term plateau, or table-land, seems to be sometimes used as indicating high flat lands as distinct from lower flat lands; but even if it obtains currency in this sense, it is by no means sufficient*.

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We have before spoken of valleys. A valley, we find, is often defined very loosely as the low ground between mountains, and as generally traversed by a river." From this definition it must follow that a great many rivers flow in valleys for only a small part of their course, and some certainly flow in no valleys at all. It might however possibly be useful to consider all streams as flowing in valleys, provided we assign to these valleys specific names, derived from some one or more properties by which they are characterized.

There seems to be no method of imprinting on the memory a tolerably correct outline of the great boundaries of the land and water on the globe, except by some method similar to that of Professor Agren. (See Journal of Education, No. XI. p. 27, &c.) And we think there can be no difference of opinion at all on the necessity of teaching boys, or rather, according to Agren's

See Berghaus, p. 41, &c., on flat lands, &c. His division appears founded too much on bare elevation, which we think insufficient.

plan, inducing them to teach themselves under what parallels and meridians all the great limiting points of the land are placed. For instance, a boy should be able to refer from memory such points as the Cape of Good Hope, Cape Verde, Cape Guardafui, the Straits of Gibraltar, the most southern point of Spain, the most southern point of the Morea (not the most southern point of Europe, as is sometimes stated), the mouth of the Rhine, Danube, &c., to their right astronomical position on the earth's surface. Such a bare outline as this, if a boy learned nothing at all beyond it, would save him from much confusion and numberless ridiculous errors. But this frame-work, when gradually filled up, would present to the mind a number of subdivisions, to each of which the pupil would readily refer all isolated facts, as they occur in his various readings, or whenever they are presented to him with sufficiently accurate data; he thus would acquire a real geographical picture of the earth, the great outlines of which might be continually approximating more and more to accuracy without deranging the general impression. In a similar way he would print on his memory and imagination the general direction of the great mountain ranges, and the exact position of their more remarkable points. Both for those who make geography their special study, and for the botanist, zoologist, and geologist, such a foundation of geographical knowledge is absolutely indispensable. In all the three last departments of knowledge here alluded to, can we doubt that many erroneous generalizations, and often inconsistent assertions, would be checked if a man always had this fundamental knowledge of geography?* Men cannot always write with * One instance is as good as a hundred. A modern writer on

maps before them, nor are men always willing to be making constant references to such very troublesome monitors as good maps are; sometimes most unkindly overturning a whole heap of hypotheses, ingenious conjectures, and pleasant, easy, self-satisfying generaliza

tions.

To acquire an accurate and at the same time a complete geographical picture of a country, we must see it represented under various forms; we must have in fact a series of maps with the same outline, but a different filling in. Our own island, for example, might be represented, first with a bare coast outline and the courses of the rivers. This should be studied after the method of Agren till the picture is distinctly impressed on the mind. In a second map we would place the high ground and the rivers also. Other maps might be constructed to show the artificial water system of canals, in connexion with the natural water system of rivers. A map of roads, with all the great towns indicated, and all the seats of manufacturing industry, would also be necessary; and other maps no doubt might be suggested. Such maps roughly executed would soon be produced at a very moderate charge, if a sufficient demand for them could be calculated on.

It is impossible, in our opinion, to urge too strongly the importance of an exact knowledge of position on the earth's surface. This knowledge is not only the true basis of all geographical knowledge, but it is an indis

geology says that the Pyrenees, the Apennines, the mountains of Dalmatia, and Croatia, the Carpathians, and the Alleghanies of America, are all parallel to an are of a great circle, which passes through Natchez and the mouth of the Persian Gulf; of course they are also all parallel to one another. Such an assertion can hardly be surpassed for absurdity.

pensable element in every science which has for its object the observation and the comparison of natural phenomena in different parts of the earth. Without this knowledge the geographer has laid no foundation for his further pursuits, and the inquirer into nature will often fall into error, which may sometimes seriously affect his conclusions.

Next to the teaching of the general outline of countries, with their mountains and rivers, the most important thing is climate, or the comparison of meteorological phenomena as ascertained at different points of the earth's surface. This should, of course, be preceded by exact notions of the phenomena of the seasons, the length of day and night at different points on the earth's surface, the modes of determining the four cardinal points at any place, with the determination of the sun's angular distance at rising and setting from the east and west points at any season of the year, &c., the mode of measuring the shortest distance between any two points given in position on the earth's surface, reducing magnetic to true bearings, &c. Without this preliminary knowledge we do not see how the subject of climate can be treated satisfactorily, even in an elementary way. It would also furnish opportunities for giving a student a variety of easy problems, to the solution of which he might apply his mathematical acquire

ments.

We have already excluded the geographical distribution of plants and animals from the province of the geographer, with an earnest request to botanists and zoologists to look carefully after them, for nobody else can do it so well. But it does not follow that, in teaching the great principles of geography, these considera