account of their cost, bulk and weight, but their great use in teaching geography is undeniable.
Globes.[1]—It is impossible to represent on a plane the whole of the earth’s surface, or even a large extent of it, without a considerable amount of distortion. On the other hand a map drawn on the surface of a sphere representing a terrestrial globe will prove true to nature, for it possesses, in combination, the qualities which the ingenuity of no mathematician has hitherto succeeded in imparting to a projection intended for a map of some extent, namely, equivalence of areas of distances and angles. Nevertheless, it should be observed that our globes take no account of the oblateness of our sphere; but as the difference in length between the circumference of the equator and the perimeter of a meridian ellipse only amounts to 0.16%, it could be shown only on a globe of unusual size.
The method of manufacturing a globe is much the same as it was at the beginning of the 16th century. A matrix of wood or iron is covered with successive layers of papers, pasted together so as to form pasteboard. The shell thus formed is then cut along the line of the intended equator into two hemispheres, they are then again glued together and made to revolve round an axis the ends of which passed through the poles and entered a metal meridian circle. The sphere is then coated with plaster or whiting, and when it has been smoothed on a lathe and dried, the lines representing meridians and parallels are drawn upon it. Finally the globe is covered with the paper gores upon which the map is drawn. The adaption of these gores to the curvature of the sphere calls for great care. Generally from 12 to 24 gores and two small segments for the polar regions printed on vellum paper are used for each globe. The method of preparing these gores was originally found empirically, but since the days of Albert Dürer it has also engaged the minds of many mathematicians, foremost among whom was Professor A. G. Kästner of Göttingen. One of the best instructions for the manufacture of globes we owe to Altmütter of Vienna.[2]
Larger globes are usually on a stand the top of which supports an artificial horizon. The globe itself rotates within a metallic meridian to which its axis is attached. Other accessories are an hour-circle, around the north pole, a compass placed beneath the globe, and a flexible quadrant used for finding the distances between places. These accessories are indispensable if it be proposed to solve the problems usually propounded in books on the “use of the globes,” but can be dispensed with if the globe is to serve only as a map of the world. The size of a globe is usually given in terms of its diameter. To find its scale divide the mean diameter of the earth (1,273,500 m.) by the diameter of the globe; to find its circumference multiply the diameter by π (3.1416).
Map Printing.—Maps were first printed in the second half of the 15th century. Those in the Rudimentum novitiarum published at Lübeck in 1475 are from woodcuts, while the maps in the first two editions of Ptolemy published in Italy in 1472 are from copper plates. Wood engraving kept its ground for a considerable period, especially in Germany, but copper in the end supplanted it, and owing to the beauty and clearness of the maps produced by a combination of engraving and etching it still maintains its ground. The objection that a copper plate shows signs of wear after a thousand impressions have been taken has been removed, since duplicate plates are readily produced by electrotyping, while transfers of copper engravings, on stone, zinc or aluminium, make it possible to turn out large editions in a printing-machine, which thus supersedes the slow-working hand-press.[3] These impressions from transfers, however, are liable to be inferior to impressions taken from an original plate or an electrotype. The art of lithography greatly affected the production of maps. The work is either engraved upon the stone (which yields the most satisfactory result at half the cost of copper-engraving), or it is drawn upon the stone by pen, brush or chalk (after the stone has been “grained”), or it is transferred from a drawing upon transfer paper in lithographic ink. In chromolithography a stone is required for each colour. Owing to the great weight of stones, their cost and their liability of being fractured in the press, zinc plates, and more recently aluminium plates, have largely taken the place of stone. The processes of zincography and of algraphy (aluminium printing) are essentially the same as lithography. Zincographs are generally used for producing surface blocks or plates which may be printed in the same way as a wood-cut. Another process of producing such blocks is known as cerography (Gr. κηρός), wax. A copper plate having been coated with wax, outline and ornament are cut into the wax, the lettering is impressed with type, and the intaglio thus produced is electrotyped.[4] Movable types are utilized in several other ways in the production of maps. Thus the lettering of the map, having been set up in type, is inked in and transferred to a stone or a zinc-plate, or it is impressed upon transfer-paper and transferred to the stone. Photographic processes have been utilized not only in reducing maps to a smaller scale, but also for producing stones and plates from which they may be printed. The manuscript maps intended to be produced by photographic processes upon stone, zinc or aluminium, are drawn on a scale somewhat larger than the scale on which they are to be printed, thus eliminating all those imperfections which are inherent in a pen-drawing. The saving in time and cost by adopting this process is considerable, for a plan, the engraving of which takes two years, can now be produced in two days. Another process, photo- or heliogravure, for obtaining an engraved image on a copper plate, was for the first time employed on a large scale for producing a new topographical map of the Austrian Empire in 718 sheets, on a scale of 1:75,000, which was completed in seventeen years (1873–1890). The original drawings for this map had to be done with exceptional neatness, the draughtsman spending twelve months on that which he would have completed in four months had it been intended to engrave the map on copper; yet an average chart, measuring 530 by 630 mm., which would have taken two years and nine months for drawing and engraving, was completed in less than fifteen months—fifty days of which were spent in “retouching” the copper plate. It only cost £169 as compared with £360 had the old method been pursued.
For details of the various methods of reproduction see Lithography; Process, &c.
History of Cartography
A capacity to understand the nature of maps is possessed even by peoples whom we are in the habit of describing as “savages.” Wandering tribes naturally enjoy a great advantage in this respect over sedentary ones. Our arctic voyagers—Sir E. W. Parry, Sir J. Ross, Sir F. L. MacClintock and others—have profited from rough maps drawn for them by Eskimos. Specimens of such maps are given in C. F. Hall’s Life with the Esquimaux (London, 1864). Henry Youle Hind, in his work on the Labrador Peninsula (London, 1863) praises the map which the Montagnais and Nasquapee Indians drew upon bark. Similar essays at map-making are reported in connexion with Australians, Maoris and Polynesians. Tupaya, a Tahitian, who accompanied Captain Cook in the “Endeavour” to Europe, supplied his patron with maps; Raraka drew a map in chalk of the Paumotu archipelago on the deck of Captain Wilkes’s vessel; the Marshall islanders, according to Captain Winkler (Marine Rundschau, Oct. 1893) possess maps upon which the bearings of the islands are indicated by small strokes. Far superior were the maps found among the semi-civilized Mexicans when the Spaniards first discovered and invaded their country. Among them were cadastral plans of villages, maps of the provinces of the empire of the Aztecs, of towns and of the coast. Montezuma presented Cortes with a map, painted on Nequen cloth, of the Gulf coast. Another map did the Conquistador good service on his campaign against Honduras (Lorenzana, Historia de nueva España, Mexico, 1770; W. H. Prescott, History of the Conquest of Mexico, New
