Abstract
THE Bulletin of the Paris Geographical Society for the present year (Nos. 1 and 2) contain several papers of interest. We need do no more than mention M. Ch. Mannoir's annual report on the progress of geography during the past year, which fills 130 pages. M. Grandidier writes on the rivers and lagoons of part of the east coast of Madagascar, and M. Gouin, of Nam-dinh, contributes a long paper on Tonquin, which deals with the commercial geography of the country rather than with the geography proper. No. 2 opens with the report of a strong Committee of the Society on the orthography of geographical names, which will be read with interest. No elaborate or exhaustive reforms are proposed; the suggestions are rather a series of simple modifications “based on good sense rather than on high philological science, which is only accessible to the few initiated.” The Committee take up the programme of the Royal Geographical Society, “completing it in some respects, and making some additions sensible to musical ears.” The bases of the proposals are the same as those of our own Society: (1) not to seek an absolute perfection in the representation of sounds; (2) to preserve in European names the form of the country of their origin; (3) to retain in the case of other places the mode commonly employed. M. Rolland contributes a long paper on the hydrography and orography of the Algerian Sahara; and M. Marteil examines the map of the French establishments on the Senegal recently issued by the Ministry of Marine. Lieut. Baudens describes a trip which he made last year along the Black River of Tonquin; and finally there is an account written by Dr. Potagos in 1880 of a journey which he made in the Pamir in 1870, including a visit to the famous Yakub Beg of Kashgar.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Geographical Notes . Nature 35, 60 (1886). https://doi.org/10.1038/035060a0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/035060a0