isa-normaladvance-1909-00034

Description:	34THE NORMAL ADVANCEA Brief Account Rendered of a Hundred DaysOut of SchoolBy DR. C. R. DRYER of the Department of Geography and GeologyBy leaving Terre Haute on Saturday beforeCommencement, and returning on Mondayafter the fall term enrollment, the head of thedepartment managed to have in 1908 100 consecutive days for field work. On the eveningof July 1 he landed at Cherbourg and arrivedin Paris the following morning. On July 6 hemet Professor Johnson of Harvard and hisparty of students at Clermont-Ferrand, andspent two days among the Puys, or volcaniccones, of Auvergne. Railway travel by dayonly, for three days, took him over the Juraand the Alps by the Mount Cenis tunnel,across the plain of Piedmont by Turin toGenoa, and thence along the west coast of Italybetween the Mediterranean and the marbleApennines to Rome. A week in the EternalCity was long enough to get some idea of theproblem of building and maintaining a moderncity upon ground so heavily encumbered withthe ruins of the past. A days ride up thevalley of the Tiber and down that of the Arnobrought him to Florence, where he was notmore impressed by the beauties of nature andart than by the number of great men who havelived and worked in the little city. Anotherdays journey over the Apennines throughfifty tunnels and across the rich plain of thePo led to Venice, the city which possesses afew squares of plaza, palace and cathedral,probably the most beautiful in the world, andfor the rest is a marvel of medieval inconvenience and unfitness for human habitation andbusiness. Any radical change in these conditions seems impossible. Another mornings ridewas along the foothills of the Alps, throughthe great semi-circle of moraines which sweepsaround the foot of Lake Garda, to Milan.There the cathedral, built wholly of marblefrom foundation to tip, including the roof surmounted by a forest of spires and statues,seemed easily the greatest feat of architectureever accomplished by man. Two days uponthe Italian lakes, Como, Lugano and Maggiore,were sufficient to deepen and fix impressions ofthe beauty and geological marvel of these inland fiords. Thence the Alps were recrossedby the Simplon tunnel and the Rhone valley toGeneva, where one week was spent in attendance as a delegate to the Ninth InternationalCongress of Geography. Nearly 700 geographers from every civilized country of the world,met in fourteen sections to discuss as manydifferent aspects of the science. They also assisted in the celebration of the 615th anniversary of the declaration of Swiss independence.Following the Congress, two weeks were spentamong the peaks, snow fields, glaciers andlakes of the high Alps, including Mont Blancand the Mer de Glace, Monte Rosa, the Matter-horn and the Gorner Glacier, the RhoneGlacier, Grimsel Pass and Aar Valley, thelakes of Brienz and Thun, Lauterbrunnen, theJungfrau and Grindelwald, Lucerne, Mt.Pilatus, the Lake of the Four Cantons andZurich and thence to the Rhine at Basel. Thejourney down the broad valley of the middleRhine was broken by a night at Freiburg andan early morning glimpse into the Black Forest. The trip by steamer from Mayence toCologne, through the most famous Rhine scenery, was scarcely more impressive than thatfrom Albany to New York on the Hudson. Toone coming directly from the Alps such features necessarily seem tame. The rock of theLorelei is no higher than the cliff at the Shadesof Death, and the old castles might be toy ruinsput up for the amusement of children.The study of Holland, which might appropriately be called Waterland, was begun atAmsterdam, a typical water city with canals asmany as at Venice but far more commodious
Source:	http://indstate.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/isuarchive/id/34064
Collection:	Indiana State University Archives

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