Abstract
IT may be said at once that we regard this as one of the most important and original works in geography that have appeared within a generation. The volume should be looked upon by teachers of geography as essential to their studies. It cannot be denied that the book is not easy reading; it must have cost an immense amount of pains to write. The result is, however, worth the pains, and though readers who will follow every page with the aid of a good atlas may indeed find that they make but slow progress, they will be well rewarded for their labour and lose all desire to hurry through the interest roused by tracing the author's line of thought. There are no doubt many who, with the best will in the world, cannot find the necessary time to complete the study of the whole work. We would advise these first, if they must read the volume piecemeal, to keep it always at hand, and, second, at least to find the time to master the author's account, say, of the situation of Moscow (pp. 181–91) or London (pp. 211 and onwards). If one of these has been read with the necessary care, the reader, if he has been hitherto unfamiliar with the geographical point of view, can scarcely fail thenceforth to understand what geography means, and even professed geographers will be warned against one danger now rather prevalent arising from a too narrow study of “natural regions.” Dr. Cornish never fails to take into account the wide-reaching influences on the rise and growth of towns.
The Great Capitals: an Historical Geography.
By Dr. Vaughan Cornish. Pp. xii + 296. (London: Methuen and Co., Ltd., 1923.) 12s. 6d. net.
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CHISHOLM, G. Geographical Influences. Nature 112, 320 (1923). https://doi.org/10.1038/112320a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/112320a0