systems or lack of system characteristic of maps and geograph- ical works hitherto having 1 been found to be a real inconvenience in geographical investigations during the war.
Education. The position of geography in the British educa- tional system came periodically under discussion before the war, and had been materially strengthened in some directions, but not in all. The war, for obvious reasons, broadened interest in this subject, and its consideration was actively resumed in and after 1917. Broadly speaking, it may be stated that the position of geography was consolidated as an elementary educa- tional subject, and that its appeal was widened as a university subject, as evidenced by the establishment of honours courses in geography and the endowment of professorships (e.g. Cam- bridge University geographical tripos, 1919; chair of geography and anthropology, University College, Aberystwyth, 1918). Geography had become widely studied as a subject for the school certificate examination, although complete agreement had not been reached as to its exact scope for this purpose: for example, while one syllabus began with the study of the distribution of land and water, another went farther back, to demand some knowledge of the position of the earth as a planet, and its movements. The subject is recognized as valuable, not only for its own sake as teaching something about the world, but as a pointer to special directions of study, such as geodesy, surveying and military topography, and as an essential adjunct to such subjects as history and economics, and certain aspects of biology. It was in regard to these special applications, and par- ticularly so far as they are appropriate to advanced courses in schools, that the position of geography in education remained weak: a subject so elastic in comparison with other school subjects must necessarily be difficult to define by means of a syllabus, and it did not find wholly satisfactory expression in advanced text-books. Regarding geography thus, as a species of pivot for the study of other subjects, we may be in danger of assuming that so long as these other subjects are viewed and taught with a proper conception of the place of geography in them, the teaching of geography itself is of no consequence. But the geographical view and teaching can hardly be ensured if they be left dependent upon teachers and students of kindred branches of learning, as indeed has been sufficiently demon- strated by the position of geography in education down to quite recent years.
Exploration. Even though virgin areas of the earth's surface be now few, explorers have still many fields in which to labour at the filling-in of details. Meanwhile in the Arctic and Antarctic regions, especially the latter, there are still large areas unknown, despite the work of important expeditions (see POLAR REGIONS). In Africa plenty of geographical knowledge remains to be acquired. Here and in the tropical islands of the Malay Archi- pelago, especially New Guinea, where at many points develop- ment by white men is only in an early stage, exploration may be regarded as almost within the routine duties of European administrators, and is more or less constantly in progress.
The other principal fields for exploration are Canada and Alaska, and certain parts of South America and Asia. As regards Canada and Alaska, in addition to the investigation of the Arctic coast lands, reference may be made to Mr. Howard Palmer's study (1910) of the orography of Mt. Sir Sandford and its vicinity in the Selkirk range, B.C., to Dr. J. Norman Collie who was travelling north of the Yellowhead Pass in 1911, and to other investigators who extended the detailed knowledge of the Canadian Rockies in various directions. The research committee of the National Geographic Society granted $5,000 for the continuation in 191 1 of the glacial investigations in Alaska by Prof. R. S. Tarr and Prof. L. Martin, who led the Alaskan expedition of the Society in 1909-10 in the region of Yakut Bay, Prince William Sound, and the lower course of the Copper river. The demarcation of the Alaska-Canada boundary, running for 600 m. along the meridian 141 W., occupied commis- sions under Messrs. T. D. Craig (Canada) and T. Riggs (United States) from 1907 to 1914, when about 200 permanent boundary marks were erected. In connexion with exploration reference
may be conveniently made to the investigation of natural resources, on which subject the Canadian Commission of Con- servation has issued a valuable series of reports (down to 1920), dealing with water-power in British Columbia, power (in- cluding water, coal and natural gas) in Alberta, etc.
In South America, Major Fawcett in 1910 undertook further exploration in Bolivia, in the valley of the Heath and adjacent territories. Following upon earlier reports by this officer, work on the demarcation of the Brazil-Bolivia boundary was pro- ceeded with in 1911-2. In Jan. 1911 Col. A. J. Woodroffe led a party of British officers lent to the Peruvian Government for the demarcation of the frontier with Bolivia, and the work was carried on in 1912-3. The Yale Corporation sent an expedition to Peru in 1911, under the direction of Prof. Hiram Bingham, with Prof. Isaiah Bowman as geographer and geologist, and Mr. K. Hendrikson as topographer. It was divided into three parties, to carry out archaeological, topographical, and geological explorations, and had three fields of operations the Urubamba river and its affluents, a trans-Andean section from the head of navigation on the Urubamba to the Pacific, and the vicinity of Mt. Coropuna (the estimated height of which was reduced to 21,700 ft.) and Lake Parinacochas. Notes on the human and economic geography of the region were collected by Bowman, who followed up this work by making another journey in 1913, when he made similar studies in the Andes of north-west Argen- tina, the Titicaca-Poopo basin, and the desert of Atacama. Prof. W. Sievers in 1909-10 placed the true source of the Maranon (upper Amazon) in the glacier of Mt. San Lorenzo. In 1912-3 Dr. Hamilton Rice was at work in the north-west of the Amazon basin, S.E. of Bogota, Colombia, and in the same years Dr. Koch-Grtinberg made a second expedition in northern Brazil, about the headwaters of the Branco and the Orinoco and the connecting waterway of the Cassiquiare.
Among recent journeys in central Asia may be mentioned that of Mr. D. Carruthers, whose party, in 19 months' work (1910-1), covered much ground in the upper Yenisei region, Mongolia and Dzungaria. In the same years the French traveller Dr. Legendre carried out important exploration in western China, especially in the valley of the Yalung between 28 and 30 N. In India, Sir M. A. Stein investigated (1911-2) numerous sites of archaeological interest in the course of an exploratory journey on the north-west frontier, and in 1913-5 extended his researches in the Lop-nor, Turfan, and other areas, including the Pamirs. The punitive expedition (1912) against the Abors in the north-east added considerably to topographical knowledge in spite of extreme difficulties of trans- port, heavy forests, and misty and wet weather. One party explored the River Dihong as far as Shimong for the first time, and carried mapping above that point; another surveyed the Padam Abor country; others, again, broke new ground in the Galong Abor country and in the valley of the Subansiri. Con- siderable corrections were found necessary in existing maps. In 1913 the Indian and Russian triangulations were connected, after an arduous piece of survey through the difficult country from Gilgit up the Hunza gorge and over the Kilik pass. Maj. P. M. Sykes continued his journeys in Persia, and in particular studied the problems connected with the ancient territory of Parthia. Dr. A. Musil in 1910 made further explorations in northern Arabia, in the region adjacent to the Hejaz railway. He claimed to have accurately identified for the first time the Mount Sinai of the Bible. The extensive surveys carried out in Mesopotamia during the war may fairly be mentioned in con- nexion with exploration; the information previously available, both cartographical and verbal, concerning this country was found on critical examination to be unreliable in many directions. The surveys executed in 1914-8 covered nearly all southern Mesopotamia, with adjacent parts of Persia and Arabia.
In 1920-1 an expedition having for its objects the ascent of Mt. Everest, and (as ancillary thereto) the scientific study of the territory surrounding the mountain, was organized by the Royal Geographical Society and the Alpine Club. The consent of the Dalai Lama of Tibet was secured, and arrangements
