ANSWERS

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Questions on Geography.

I. From the two words geo (earth) and graphy (description).

2. Three: Mathematical, Physical and Political.

3. It treats of the form, magnitude, and motions of the earth, and of the various imaginary lines on the surface.

4. It treats of the solid and fluid parts of the earth's surface, the atmosphere, and all animal and vegetable life. 5. It treats of the various countries on the earth's surface; the people, customs, religion, and government. 6. A sphere flattened at the ends.

7. By the revolution of the earth while in a plastic. condition.

8. About twenty-six miles, the diameter at the equator being 7,925 miles.

9. An imaginary line on which it performs its daily revolutions; its poles are the points where its axis meets the surface.

IO. Two: diurnal and annual. The diurnal is its motion from west to east; its annual is its revolution around the sun.

II.

The revolution of the earth on its axis.

12. The revolution of the earth around the sun.

13. The course it takes in its annual motion; its estimated length is about 600,000,000 miles.

15. It is due to the direction of the sun's rays, and is on the same principle that morn and eve are cooler than mid-day.

16. Belts, or divisions of the earth, bounded by the tropic and polar circles, of which there are five-two frigid, two temperate, and one torrid. The north frigid lies between the pole and Arctic Circle, and is 232° in width; the north temperate lies between the Arctic Circle and the Tropic of Cancer, and is 43° in width; the torrid lies between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn, and extends 232° north and south of the equator; the south temperate is of the same size as the north, and lies between the Tropic of Capricorn and the Antarctic Circle; the south frigid is all of the earth's surface south of the Antarctic Circle.

17. It is 661⁄2 degrees, or 231⁄2 degrees out of a perpendicular direction.

18. During the revolution of the earth around the sun a part of the earth's surface comes directly perpendicular to the sun's rays. This belt, 47° wide, is enclosed by the tropics, and termed torrid, meaning great heat. Geographers have decided that the limit of the temperate zones should be to that line where the length of the longest day is twenty-four hours, and as the inclination of the earth is 232° that line should be 231⁄2° from the poles, where the polar circles have been drawn.

19.

What the exact influence upon the earth's climate would be, might be difficult to determine, but during the annual revolution of the earth the entire surface would come directly perpendicular to the sun's rays, and become torrid. When one pole would come perpendicular to the sun's rays, the other would necessarily be in darkness, and frigid. The length of the longest day at the equator would be twenty-four hours, and would occur every six months.

This would give, at the equator, four zones in one year⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ two torrid and two temperate.

20. If the earth was perpendicular to the plane of its orbit there would be no change of seasons, but as it becomes inclined the position of the earth to the sun is changed in its annual revolution, consequently this change must produce a diversity of climate. It is by this inclination that the temperate zones have four seasons.

21. The inclination of the earth will vary that line where the length of the longest day is twenty-four hours, one degree for every degree of inclination. As it is now 23%, the line must be 232° from the poles, or the boundary of the frigid zones. If the inclination should be 20°, the frigid zones would extend 30°, and 30° each side of the equator would become perpendicular to the sun's rays, making the torrid 60°, the temperate 30° and the frigid 30°; and so on of any other degree of inclination. The frigid zone would be in width the number of degrees of the inclination of the earth; the torrid would be the same each side of the equator, and the temperate what lies between.

22.

A magnetic needle, resting upon a pivot, enclosed in a circular box. It always points nearly north. The cardinal points are north, south, east, and west.

23. Into great and small circles. the meridians and the equator; the

The great circles are

small circles are the

tropic and polar circles, and the parallels of latitude.

24. Into 360 equal parts, called degrees.

25. A drawing representing a part or whole of the earth's surface.

26. The equator, meridians, parallels, tropic and polar circles.

27. A great circle equally distant from the poles.

28. It crosses the mouth of the Amazon river, Brazil, United States of Columbia, Ecuador, Pacific Ocean, East

Indies Celebes, Borneo, Sumatra), Indian Ocean, Zanguebar, Ethiopia, Lower Guinea, Atlantic Ocean.

29. Any great circle passing through the poles. A meridian is half a meridian circle.

30. The distance either east or west from any given

meridian.

31. The one which passes through Washington, and the one near Greenwich.

32.

33.

34.

About 77°.

180 either east or west.

If situated on the meridian from which we reckon, it can have no longitude.

35. It has no latitude, and but one degree of longitude,

west.

36. Sixty geographical miles at the equator, but they gradually grow less as they approach the poles; in latitude 30 it is about fifty-two geographical miles; in latitude 60° it is thirty, and at the poles it is nothing.

37. All meridian lines terminate at the poles, and as a degree of longitude is enclosed by meridian lines, the length must decrease as the lines approach the poles.

38. New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia. and North Carolina.

39. Siberia, and Chinese Empire.

41. The distance north or south of the equator, called north and south latitude.

42.

90°, which is at the poles.

43. Sixty geographical, or 694 statute miles.

44. Bahama Islands, Florida Strait, Gulf of Mexico, Mexico, Pacific Ocean, Sandwich Islands, near Canton (China), Burmah, Hindoostan, Arabian Sea, Muscat (Arabia), Egypt, Sahara Desert, and Atlantic Ocean.

45. Near Rio Janeiro, Paraguay, the Northern part of the Argentine Republic, the southern part of Bolivia,

Pacific Ocean, Central Australia, Isle of Madagascar, Southern Africa, and Atlantic Ocean.

46. Greenland, British America, Alaska, Behring strait, Siberia, northern part of Russia, Lapland, Sweden, Norway, and Atlantic Ocean.

47. Discoveries of land have been made in this region, but the cold is so great that animal or vegetable life does not exist.

48. In the northern hemisphere there are vast tracts of land to receive the rays of heat and warm the atmosphere; but towards the south pole the rays of heat are lost on the great bodies of water, and the air is not warmed.

49.

The southern part of British America.

50. Cold winds from the north and the Arctic current which flows near the coast of Labrador, cause the climate to be too cold for cultivation, while in the same latitude in England snow is seldom seen, which is due to the nearness of the warm waters of the Gulf Stream, a branch of which flows into the Irish Sea, and the northeast current flows by the coast of Norway. This stream renders the climate of Western Europe mild and moist.

51 It is by the presence of the Japan current, which brings the warm waters of the torrid zone.

52. It issues from the Gulf of Mexico, spreads out a breadth of 150 miles, and sweeps along the shore of North America to Newfoundland. Here it meets the Arctic current and divides into two branches, one of which takes a southeasterly course towards the coast of Africa, while the other flows in a northeasterly direction towards the British Isles and Norway.

53. It is situated in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, consisting of seaweed, and occupies the eddy or whirl caused by the several ocean currents which surround it. It is a Spanish name, meaning grassy.

54.