earth set before the ambition and daring of explorers. Both were achieved within three years of each other, the North Pole by Peary in April, 1909, and the South Pole by Amundsen in December, 1911, and by Scott a month later. Large areas of the earth's surface, in Asia, Africa, South America and the polar regions remain practically unknown and undeveloped. They will continue to attract the explorer for detailed examination, but his discoveries will have little of the appeal to the popular mind of the great achievements of the past.
This little book tells the story of geographical discovery from the earliest times. Beginning with the spread of conquest in the ancient world, the science of geography languished during the Dark Ages, to be revived by the travels of Marco Polo and other mediæval travellers. From Prince Henry the Navigator and Columbus to Peary and Scott, the story is one of steady progress and of unfailing interest. An appendix gives a survey of the annals of geographical discovery for twenty-five centuries.
July, 1915.
