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Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of square leagues of sea, thousands of islands, reefs, atolls. Up to a few years ago there were many small islands utterly unknown; even still there are some, though the charts of the Pacific are the greatest triumphs of hydrography; and though the island of the story was actually on the Admiralty charts, of what use was that fact to Lestrange?
Besides, as the reef is not marked in any of the maps, I could not but believe that it would be rendering a service to hydrography if we were to take an accurate plan of the rocks, of which Curtis could afterwards verify the true position by a second observation made with a closer precision than the one he has already taken.
When an Australian comes to England and wishes to know its essential characteristics, we shall do something more than hand him over maps and treatises on the orography and hydrography, the distribution of rainfall, of plants and animals, and the population.
To seamen, and to men connected with the sea, what do we not owe, in geography, hydrography, meteorology, astronomy, natural history? At the present moment, the world owes them large improvements in dynamics, and in the new uses of steam and iron. It may be fairly said that the mariner has done more toward the knowledge of Nature than any other personage in the world, save the physician.
But however chimerical these latter schemes may seem, there is every reason to believe that art might avail itself of these galleries for improving the imperfect drainage of the champaign country bounded by the Karst, and that stopping or opening the natural channels might very much modify the hydrography of an extensive region.
Our ideas of the hydrography of this great basin have been revolutionized since Stanley, second only to Livingstone among the great African explorers, in 1877 revealed the course of the main river. On his map, for example, he showed the southern tributaries as probably flowing nearly due north; but all except one of these rivers rise in the east and flow far to the west.
In 1853, Count Pourtalès, an officer of the United States Coast Survey, which has done so much for scientific hydrography, observed, that the mud forming the sea-bottom at depths of one hundred and fifty fathoms, in 31° 32' N., 79° 35' W., off the Coast of Florida, was "a mixture, in about equal proportions, of Globigerinoe and black sand, probably greensand, as it makes a green mark when crushed on paper."
But science, in particular, represented the major investment of this library: books on mechanics, ballistics, hydrography, meteorology, geography, geology, etc., held a place there no less important than works on natural history, and I realized that they made up the captain's chief reading.
The whereabouts of the portion of the globe under consideration could be accurately ascertained. There was neither surprise nor disappointment to be feared in that respect. Situation, orientation, outline, altitudes, levels, hydrography, climatology, lines of communication, all these were easily to be verified in advance.
Cutting of Isthmuses Canal of Suez Maritime Canals in Greece Canals to Dead Sea Canals to Libyan Desert Maritime Canals in Europe Cape Cod Canal Changes in Caspian Diversion of the Nile Diversion of the Rhine Improvements in North American Hydrography Soil below Rock Covering Rock with Earth Desert Valleys Effects of Mining Duponchel's Plans of Improvement Action of Man on the Weather Resistance to Great Natural Forces Incidental Effects of Human Action Nothing small in Nature.
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