Abstract
THE title of this work is somewhat misleading. The “physical” and “historical” elements are so meagre that they are scarcely worth mentioning as features of the work. To call this a “complete gazetteer of the world” is a misuse of the term “complete;” incomplete would have been more accurate. Even on the scale of the present work it would take a gazetteer at least three times its size to contain anything like a register of all the places one would naturally expect to find in a “complete” gazetteer. The work includes a selection of the more important places in the world, very few towns, for example, out of the United Kingdom being given, whose population is under 1,000. We find no fault with the publication of a selective gazetteer, but it should not pretend to be more than it is. When compared with Ritter's well-known work, e.g., the proportion of places found in the latter as compared with “Johnston” is something like five to one. We believe a service would be done to the public by the issue of a gazetteer containing simply all the names omitted in “Johnston.”It is not for well-known places we turn up a gazetteer, but for names that one seldom hears. During these Eastern troubles, how many names of places not to be found in “Johnston” have become of great importance, and during the war just begun how many more are likely to come prominently into notice? On the other hand, much valuable space is occupied with catalogues of streets and public buildings in the articles devoted to well-known places like London, Edinburgh, Paris, Vienna, &c. All that can be said about public buildings and similar features of a town in a gazetteer of this scale is practically useless; the space would be used to much better purpose by an enlargement of the list of names. In Russia, for example, nearly all “towns” and “villages” seem to be omitted many of them with thousands of inhabitants, only “district towns,” as a rule, being given. Poland and Finland are also very unsatisfactory; in fact these countries have never been properly “gazetteered” even in Russia. In several instances the “latest” information has evidently not been obtained. To get it, indeed, would involve a vast amount of research among official publications and travellers’ narratives, but in a standard work such research is demanded. In Switzerland, we are informed by a Swiss friend, much of the information is half a century behind date. Under Chaux-de-Fonds, e.g., the statement with regard to the manufacture of chains for the movements of watches has not been true for at least thirty years; and there is no lace now made at St. Imier. To arrange the wealth of information published by the United States Survey alone would involve much time and labour; we fear that for the new edition this has not been thoroughly done. Nearly two years ago Mr. W. H. Dall, of the United States Coast Survey, published a Report on the mountains in the Alaska territory. Yet no use has been made of this Report though it is quite accessible. For Mount St. Elias the height in the English Admiralty Chart, 14,970 feet is given, instead of upwards of 19.000 feet, obtained by the careful measurement of the United States Survey in 1874. The height of Mount Fairweather is set down as 14,708 (1855) instead of 15,500 (1874); Mount Crillon 13,500 instead of 15,900; Mount Cook 16,000, Mount La Perouse 11,300, and Mount Vancouver 13,100 feet, are not given. Such imperfections make one doubt if this new edition has been “thoroughly revised.” It is easy to give information contained in census tables and in other gazetteers and guide-books, but even a work on the limited scale of the present cannot be made throughout trustworthy without very considerable trouble being taken.
A General Dictionary of Geography, Descriptive, Physical, Statistical, Historical; forming a Complete Gazetteer of the World.
By A. Keith Johnston New edition, thoroughly revised. (London: Longmans and Co., 1877.)
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A General Dictionary of Geography, Descriptive, Physical, Statistical, Historical; forming a Complete Gazetteer of the World . Nature 16, 82 (1877). https://doi.org/10.1038/016082a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/016082a0