native State.

The remainder of the American continent should follow, with the islands along its coasts. Then Africa and Asia. Every region has its points of interest, but a careful discrimination should be exercised, and time and labor be given to those portions of the world a knowledge of which would prove most satisfactory, agreeable, improving, and useful. To devote much time to crowding the memory with many of the names of places in Africa, for instance, which one would scarcely meet with, except in a treatise on Geography, in the whole subsequent course of his life, would hardly be a wise appropriation of time and study.*

Europe, in its various divisions of Northern, Southern, Central, &c., concentrating so many specimens of grandeur, beauty, natural curiosities and interesting phenomena, and presenting, in its historical records, such a storehouse of the wonderful, the heroic, the patriotic, the scientific, the brave, the self-sacrificing, and the patiently enduring, -besides having been the home of our fathers, will naturally be found the most attractive and interesting to the learner, of the various foreign regions of the world. He should therefore dwell longest upon, and make himself best acquainted with, that portion of the world; and, as I have before intimated, should be directed by the teacher, as he is mapping out the different parts of Europe, either as countries, districts, or cities, to the birthplaces of the world's benefactors; the scenes of their labors, their sufferings, or their glory. He should remember the good of all creeds, - Plato and Aristides, Brutus and the Gracchi, Alfred and Charlemagne, Gustavus Vasa and William Tell, Laplace and Humboldt, Shakspeare and Milton, Newton and Wilberforce, Fenelon and Jenner, and Hannah More and Grace Darling, and Mrs. Frye and Florence Nightingale,- omitting none of either sex, wherever humanity demands a notice of them.

Palestine and other parts of Asia will also readily attract his attention, and the scenes in which the patriarchs and prophets of the

*It is not indispensable that the precise order of the maps attempted, as above indicated, should be invariably followed. There may be a better arrangement. In some atlases a convenient and rational order is laid down; and if outline maps, adapted to them, can be had, they will prove an important gain to the learner. My object is to secure a rational and regularly progressive order, which with some is sacrificed to inadequate considerations.

It would be nearly, if not quite, impossible for the pupil, in the usual time devoted to school education, to draw a map or maps of every considerable portion of the globe, without injustice to other studies. It is, therefore, proper to begin with those in which we have the greatest interest, or with whose inhabitants we cherish friendly or business relations. After this suggestion, the teacher's own reflection will be a sufficient guide.

Hebrews took part, and those which were rendered sacred and memorable by the establishment of the Christian religion and the attendant "mighty works" and sufferings of its great Head, Bethlehem, Nazareth, Jerusalem, Capernaum, Mounts Zion and Tabor, and the Mount of Olives, all these should be pointed out. The birthplace of Paul; the isle of Patmos, where John closed his long and memorable life; and whatever else of equal interest is known concerning these and other distinguished men, who figured in the sacred history and geography of their times.

In sketching the maps of our own country, the same course should be pursued, and the pupil's attention drawn not only to the birthplaces of the great and good men who have lived and left examples behind for our benefit and imitation, but also to the spots consecrated by their deeds, or by their blood shed in the cause of national freedom, as Lexington, Bunker Hill, Yorktown, Saratoga, Trenton, Long Island. These, with their heroes and martyrs, should be commemorated. Mere military success I should not deem sufficient cause to "make a note of;" but in other countries, as well as in our own, where victory in battle had enabled an oppressed people to throw off the yoke of tyranny, or assist in setting a nation free, I would direct the attention of the learner to it, and to the leading spirits of the struggle. And this would introduce such places as Marathon, Thermopyla, and Bannockburn.

If it be objected that this is history or biography, I reply, that no better auxiliary to the teaching of geography can be introduced than those facts and men, which places on the earth bring to the mind, when they are truly memorable in themselves. I would further maintain that geography and history should not be separated, but be always taught and studied together. One assists in acquiring and retaining the memory of the other, and both increase in interest from the union.

The teacher may throw in many a useful word to his pupils in their process of map-drawing, especially in regard to the ridges or chains of mountains in the several continents-how they follow, in their direction, apparently, one particular law or rule in one hemisphere, and a different one in another; so that an observant eye may distinguish the country to which the mountains belong, simply by the direction and relations of the mountains themselves. So in regard to the course of rivers, whose tendencies are in uniform directions in neighboring localities. The teacher will here indicate the cause of this, and also, when their directions vary, state what is the cause of such variation.

The pupil observes, that, in some parts of the world, there are but

few rivers. He may not speak of this, but should have the reason for the fact stated to him. He finds, too, that in some countries there is little or no rain; in others, a great deal; and in others still, periodical seasons of rain, lasting for months together. Tell him why it is so. Also, the causes of the trade winds, whose operations scem so wonderful, and yet are made so subservient to the welfare of the mercantile world.

Let him know something of longitude and latitude, and, as soon as he is able to comprehend their meaning, give him simple problems, to test the utility of this knowledge. In travelling, he hears his father say his watch is too slow, and that they are about two hundred miles from home, in an easterly direction. Ask him the longitude of the place, and if he knows the longitude of his own residence, he will say it is, or about three degrees less than at his own home, and that the watch is twelve minutes slow. Or, he has travelled in an opposite direction about ninety miles, and his watch is fast, and he may perceive and say that the watch is fast six minutes, and the longitude is one and a half degrees greater than at his own residence. He reads in a newspaper that a ship has been spoken at sea, in a given latitude and longitude, and, turning to a map covering that point, he will see just where the vessel was, at the particular hour when she was seen and spoken.

Tell him, at this stage of his progress, that while we measure the sun's time east and west, we reckon his degree of heat north and south. Hence he will perceive that, in going from this latitude towards the north pole, the cold will continually increase; and that in travelling in the opposite direction, till he reaches the equator, the heat increases in a similar ratio. Give him next some account of the zones, and the causes of the varied temperature in each. Direct his attention to the productions of these widely-differing portions of the globe. He will perceive that they are distinctly marked in every department of creation, — man, beast, reptile, bird, vegetable, fruit, flower, and that the production of one zone is rarely found living or growing spontaneously within another, excepting in contiguous or proximating parts. Tell him where to look for the strong, industrious, intelligent, matter-of-fact man, who earns his subsistence and makes the world happier by his labor; and show him that the animals, the fruits, and the vegetable productions of that zone partake of qualities adapted to just that race of men.

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The same may be said of the others. Where the physical wants of man are few, little in the way of labor is required of him. Excessive heat abates his strength, and nature feeds and clothes him from

her ample storehouse. She feasts him on her luscious fruits, regales his ear with her rich music, fascinates his eye with her gorgeous coloring, and ravishes his smell with her exquisite odors.

In others, again,-in the colder portions, where little grows or can grow, the inhabitants are few, and they become inured to hardship, and do but little else than perform the natural functions which carry them through a brief and precarious existence. The few brute animals and vegetable productions thereof, partake of the same low grade of properties and qualities, and exhibit a rigid adaptation to what may be termed the law of the climate.

Hence, the pupil may be led to know what to expect from man, beast, fruit, and flower, by ascertaining the part of the globe — mainly the latitude-in which they are found. Taking a list of the districts of a country, cities, and large towns, and comparing them, the known with the unknown, a pretty correct idea may be formed of the temperature and natural productions of each; the probable vigor, effeminacy, and habits of the people. This rule is not to be taken without limitation, for modifications, more or less considerable, are produced by circumstances, which should be pointed out by the teacher.

An agreeable mode of giving a practical character to this part of our subject, and one that is adopted in some schools, is, for the teacher to read from a mercantile newspaper some of the various advertisements of the merchants, making them texts to be commented upon, and to form the basis of a catechetical exercise. Here we read of tea, gunny bags, saltpetre, mace, sumac, spelter, coffee, indigo, cassia, opium, sugar, hemp. Now the question is, first, Whence came they? or, in more familiar language, Where did they come from? This question may be followed by others, in variety, to any extent that the time of the teacher will permit; as, Where is the place? is it a city? an island? what is the article advertised? what are other productions of the same place or country? the habits of the people? their history? their government? the population of their chief cities? their religion? &c.; bringing out more thought and imparting more information than the same amount of time could do in almost any other course. I am aware that the lack of time would not allow every teacher to indulge himself and his school, to any great extent, in this interesting and useful exercise; but still, in my judgment, if but fifteen minutes daily were to be thus appropriated, the advantage to the school would be great, and the good effects on the families represented therein would be strikingly observable. How many persons there are, on all sides of us, that have not the slightest idea, even, of the countries which produce the most common articles of daily domestic consump

tion or use, and even the meaning of the names of many articles constantly advertised in commercial papers! What is learned at school is usually talked about at home; and especially any new idea about things, that comes to the learner in a pleasant way, without the formality of an assigned task, and, consequently, without study.

In connection with this exercise, the routes usually pursued by navigators to and from the several ports, from which the articles of commerce, that become the subject of conversation, are imported, would be found a matter of curiosity and interest; and I believe none of our school-books in present use refer to the subject at all. I do not complain of this, but would recommend to the teacher to introduce it along with this miscellaneous exercise, as sure to give much satisfaction to the inquiring minds among his pupils. Caleb Bingham, the best teacher that Boston had in his time, had some questions and answers of this kind, in his little work, called The Geographical Catechism, which in my childhood was a great favorite with me, and whose impression, although many a long year has passed since I studied it as a class-book, is still vivid and pleasant in my memory.

Among other facilities for illustrating the subject of geography, are the raised maps, or maps in relief, representing the inequalities of the surface of the earth. These maps are found highly useful with the advanced classes of a school, whose members are capable of comprehending the scale of comparison introduced, and always fix and reward their attention. They are confined principally to mountainous countries, but are not without interest when typifying those that are comparatively flat. Several have been imported, representing Italy, Switzerland, Europe, Germany and the Netherlands, France and Belgium, Mont Blanc and environs, and others,-whose most prominent mountains can be easily recognized by those who have travelled in the several countries, and have felt a sufficient interest in the subject to ascend their grand elevations, and institute comparisons between them. Those of the greatest altitudes loom up, even in these miniature models, with a degree of grandeur not readily anticipated, when the scale on which they are necessarily projected for school uses is considered; and they challenge the admiration of the young student, as, assisted by them and his own imagination, he climbs their snowy tops, and looks, almost giddy, into the vales below.

In some portions of a country denominated "hilly," the surface of the map is little more irregular than the outside of an orange; while that of others, like Mont Blanc, presents very striking elevations.