Influences of Geographic Environment: On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-GeographySemple, Ellen Churchill
History
Influences of Geographic Environment: On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography
Semple, Ellen Churchill
Human beings -- Effect of environment on; Human geography
But when a people has advanced to a higher conception of colonization as
an outlet for national as well as commercial expansion, and when it sees
that the permanent prosperity of both race and trade in the new locality
depends upon the occupation of larger tracts of territory and the
development of local resources as a basis for exchanges, their
settlements spread from the outer rim of the coasts to its inner edge
and yet beyond, if alluvial plains and river highways are present to
tempt inland expansion. Such was the history of many later colonies of
the Greeks[438] and Carthaginians, and especially of most modern colonial
movements, for these have been dominated by a higher estimate of the
value of land.
After the long Atlantic journey, the outposts of the American coast were
welcome resting-places to the early European voyagers, but, owing to
their restricted area and therefore limited productivity, they were soon
abandoned, or became mere bases for inland expansion. The little island
of Cuttyhunk, off southern Massachusetts, was the site of Gosnold's
abortive attempt at colonization in 1602, like Raleigh's attempt on
Roanoke Island in 1585, and the later one of Popham on the eastern
headland of Casco Bay. The Pilgrims paused at the extremity of Cape Cod,
and again on Clark's Island, before fixing their settlement on Plymouth
Bay. Monhegan Island, off the Maine coast, was the site of an early
English trading post, which, however, lasted only from 1623 to 1626;[439]
and the same dates fix the beginning and end of a fishing and trading
station established on Cape Ann, and removed later to Salem harbor. The
Swedes made their first settlement in America on Cape Henlopen, at the
entrance of Delaware Bay; but their next, only seven years later, they
located well up the estuary of the Delaware River. Thus for the modern
colonist the outer edge of the coast is merely the gateway of the land.
From it he passes rapidly to the settlement of the interior, wherever
fertile soil and abundant resources promise a due return upon his labor.
[Sidenote: Interpenetration of land and sea.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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