CONDITIONS AND PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERSHIP. THE conditions of Ordinary Membership are:-Approval by the Council; the payment in the case of members in the Edinburgh district of an entrance fee of One Guinea; in the case of other members one of Half-a-Guinea; and the payment of the ordinary Annual Subscription or a composition for Life-Membership. The Annual Subscription is One Guinea, and is payable in advance at the commencement of each Session. A Member may compound for Life-Membership by payment as follows, viz. :-When under ten years' standing, £20; when over ten and under twenty years' standing, £15; when over twenty and under 30 years' standing, £10; when over thirty years' standing, £5. The Official Year, or Session, of the Society is from October 1st to September 30th. New Members are required to pay the Subscription for the Session in which they join the Society, at whatever period, and they are entitled to receive the ordinary publications of that Session. Resignations, to take effect, must be lodged with the Secretary before the commencement of a new Session. The privileges of Ordinary Membership include admission (with one Guest) to the Ordinary Meetings of the Society, and the use of the Library and Map-Room. Non-resident Members may borrow books from the Library, but they must defray the cost of transit both ways. Each Member is entitled to receive, free by post, the Scottish Geographical Magazine, which is published quarterly by the Society. TEACHER ASSOCIATE MEMBERSHIP. - With the object of helping to promote the teaching of Geography in Schools, "Teacher Associates" are admitted to certain privileges of the Society at a reduced Subscription of Fifteen Shillings. The privileges are limited to the use of the Society's Rooms, receipt of the magazine, the right to borrow one volume from the Library, and one ticket (not transferable and admitting only one) for the Society's meetings. Only professional teachers are eligible for election, and the applicants must state the name of the school at which they are engaged. STUDENT ASSOCIATES.-Students attending Scottish Universities are also admitted to the same privileges of the Society on the same terms. Branches of the Society have been established in Glasgow, Dundee, and Aberdeen, where periodical Meetings are held. CONTENTS. PAGE Afforestation in Korea. By Professor Percy M. Roxby, Some Geographical Aspects of Water-Power Development in Recent Years. Proceedings of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society, The Devastated Area in France-The Submarine Valley of Cap-Breton- The Shore-lines of Corsica -The Port of Varna-The Climate of Albania- Abyssinia and the Abyssinians-The Second Danish Thule Expedition- Scottish Canals and Waterways. By H. M. Cadell, B.Sc., F.R.S.E., D.L., Ptolemy's Map of Denmark: A Study in Conflicting Evidence. By I. A. Wind and Soil Transport-The South Orkney Observatory-A Suggested Economic Use for Opuntia-The Society's Library-The Earth's Crust and Notes on the Geographical Factors which Controlled the Spanish Advance National Collection of Old Maps of Scotland-Drought in South Africa- The late Dr. W. S. Bruce-Shackleton Memorial Fund-Royal Geographical Society's Awards - Mineral Resources of Canada-Lectureship in Geography No. IV. OCTOBER. The Republic of San Marino. By the Rev. J. Arnott Hamilton, B.D., Fellow of the Scottish Ecclesiological Society, A New Historical Geography: a Review. By Geo. G. Chisholm, Studies of the Flora of the Alps-The Calcareous Alps of Faucigny-The Resources of Asiatic Russia-The Southern Territories of Algeria-The Flora of South-East Africa-The Coasts of Madagascar-A Week on Acon- cagua-Classification and Method in Geography-Death of Captain F. B. THE SCOTTISH GEOGRAPHICAL MAGAZINE. THE ISOTHERMAL FRONTIER OF ANCIENT CITIES.1 By VAUGHAN CORNISH, D.Sc., F.R.G.S. THE northern frontier of the Roman Empire is shown in our atlases of Ancient Geography, and also that of the Achæmenian Empire of the Persians and of the dynasties which succeeded in the Middle East. The frontier of the ancient Chinese Empire has not been made similarly familiar to us, and in place of it we have grown accustomed to the representation of the Empire of China as it has been in mediæval and modern times. From this most of Manchuria, all Mongolia, and the Ili Valley must be shorn off in order to get the Chinese northern frontier as it was under the Han dynasty in the beginning of the second century after Christ, the age of the Antonines in Europe. At this time, when the ancient civilization of Eurasia was at the height of its culture and apparently at the maximum of its power, part of the northern frontier, once controlled by the Achæmenidæ, was divided between the Parthians, capitalled at Ctesiphon, and the Kushan dynasty of the Yue-chi, capitalled at Peshawar. These four northern frontiers, Roman, Parthian, Kushan, and Chinese, were consecutive, forming an unbroken line from the mouth of the Rhine near the modern Katwyk in Holland, 52° N., to the east coast of Korea in about 41° N. South of the line a vast array of established cities stretched for seven thousand miles across Eurasia, in some parts protected by natural barriers, in others defended by lines of masonry fortification. North of the line were the tents of nomads, huts of forest dwellers, and stockaded defences of earth and wood. In the northern part of modern Germany there were territories north of the line which the Romans had abandoned as untenable or unprofitable. South of the line in eastern Europe was the district of Dacia, which Augustus pre 1 A paper read to Section E (Geography) at the Hull Meeting of the British Association. VOL. XXXIX. A ferred not to touch, but which Trajan was compelled to оссuру. In this country the native people had in the interval begun to construct masonry fortifications. I have to bring before the Section the remarkable fact, which I discovered in the course of my investigation of the geography of capital cities, and which, as far as I am aware, no one else has discovered, that this northern frontier of ancient cities on the eve of the barbarian irruption has, within narrow limits of variation, the same average temperature throughout. It is a true annual isotherm, not an isotherm reduced to sea-level. Along the European part is a line of modern cities with meteorological observatories. The annual temperature of eight of these, strung out along the length, has an average of 48.6° Fahrenheit (Table I.) In Asia we are not well off for meteorological records near the line on the south, and Table II. consists of a list of towns, mostly under Russian rule, just north of the line, where proper records have been kept. It will be observed, therefore, that their temperatures are rather lower than that along the frontier of the ancient cities. The average temperature of these eight towns north of the line is 47.4° Fahrenheit. A very long gap in these towns occurs between Kuldja and Mukden, but the record for the Lukchun depression in Chinese Turkestan, a little south of the frontier, yields a not inconsistent figure, if corrected for the general height of the surrounding country, and that of Peking is not discordant. Farther east the generalized isotherm of 48.5° Fahrenheit, as shown on our atlases, reaches the eastern coast of Korea in about 41° N. (somewhat north of the peninsular portion of the country), which cannot be very far from the frontier of its ancient cities. In the detached Roman possession of Britain the inner and principal line of fortification had its western terminal at Carlisle, where the temperature is 47.8° Fahrenheit. Eastwards of the continent of Eurasia the conquest of the Japanese islands by their present masters was only completed at a much later date than that with which we are dealing, but |