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Topography   /təpˈɑgrəfi/   Listen
Topography

noun
1.
The configuration of a surface and the relations among its man-made and natural features.
2.
Precise detailed study of the surface features of a region.






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"Topography" Quotes from Famous Books



... slily watching till he heard that the strangers might be trusted; but on listening to the details given by these men of the appearances of the crops at different parts, and the astonishing minuteness of the speakers' topography, we were persuaded that in some cases we were wrong, and felt rather humiliated. Every knoll, hill, mountain, and every peak on a range has a name; and so has every watercourse, dell, and plain. In fact, every feature ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone

... the military topography of a battlefield where there was no battle must have its picturesque and pathetic episode, and Mr. Macaulay finds one well suited to such a novel. When Monmouth had made up his mind to attempt to surprise the royal army, Mr. Macaulay is willing (for a purpose which ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson

... This pleasure came often from some vital phrase, or merely the inspired music of a phrase quite apart from its meaning. I did not get then, and I have not got since, a distinct conception of the journey through Hell, and as often as I have tried to understand the topography of the poem I have fatigued myself to no purpose, but I do not think the essential meaning was ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... and longitude; footing, standing, standpoint, post; stage; aspect, attitude, posture, pose. environment, surroundings (location) 184; circumjacence &c. 227[obs3]. place, site, station, seat, venue, whereabouts; ground; bearings &c. (direction) 278; spot &c. (limited space) 182. topography, geography, chorography[obs3]; map &c. 554. V. be situated, be situate; lie, have its seat in. Adj. situate, situated; local, topical, topographical &c. n. Adv. in situ, in loco; here and there, passim; hereabouts, thereabouts, whereabouts; in place, here, there. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget

... further confusion in regard to the local topography. He says that the "three-peaked rock" which Eratosthenes describes as separating the gulfs of Cumae and Paestum (that is, of Naples and Salerno) is Mount San Costanzo. I do not understand Beloch falling into this error, for the old geographer uses the term ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas

... has yet been published. Its aim was principally to explore the region embraced by what is known as the old Spanish trail from Santa Fe to California. After giving an interesting account of the topography of the region traversed, he proceeded to speak of the traces which were found on every hand of a former occupancy by a numerous population now extinct. These were most numerous near the course of the San Juan river. There were found ruins of immense structures, a view of one of which ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various

... if so you please, Cossacques (I don't much pique myself upon orthography, So that I do not grossly err in facts, Statistics, tactics, politics, and geography)— Having been used to serve on horses' backs, And no great dilettanti in topography Of fortresses, but fighting where it pleases Their chiefs to order,—were ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... war consists in teaching how to take advantage of the irregularities of the ground on which military movements are to be made, or defensive works are to be constructed. The highest reputation of Generals in every age has resulted in their skill in military topography. The most marked compliment ever paid by one General to another, was that of Napoleon to Csar, when he halted on his encampments without a previous reconnoisance. But the regiment did not rally as stated, for it had ...
— Speeches of the Honorable Jefferson Davis 1858 • Hon. Jefferson Davis

... to corner, now and then hitching up his trousers, to give freer play to his feet, he at length comes out upon the street which fronts upon the bay. In his week's cruising about the town he has acquired some knowledge of its topography, and knows well enough where he is; but not the office of the shipping-agent. It, therefore, takes him a considerable time to find it. Along the water's edge the houses are irregularly placed, and ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid

... artistic form; and only such manifold application could have given that almost automatic certainty of taste which allowed the great art of the past to continue perpetually changing, through centuries and centuries, and adapting itself over immense geographical areas to every variation of climate, topography, mode of life, or religion. Unless the forms of ancient art had been safely embodied in a hundred modest crafts, how could they have undergone the imperceptible and secure metamorphosis from Egyptian to Hellenic, from Greek to Graeco-Roman, and thence, from Byzantine, have passed, as one great ...
— Laurus Nobilis - Chapters on Art and Life • Vernon Lee

... on the two murdered men came to an end, I observed that Mr. Cazalette, most of whose time was devoted to his numismatic work, was spending his leisure in turning over whatever books he could come across at Ravensdene Court which related to local history and topography; he was also studying old maps, charts and the like. Also, he got from London the latest Ordnance Map. I saw him studying that with deep attention. Yet he said nothing until one day, coming across me in the library, ...
— Ravensdene Court • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher

... "Topography: Villa surrounded by a large garden on three sides. The fourth side gives directly onto a wooded field that stretches to the river Neva. On this side the level of the ground is much lower, so low that the sole window opening in ...
— The Secret of the Night • Gaston Leroux

... something more than mere coincidence in the resemblance between Loch Nell and the Ohio Serpent, to say nothing of the topography of their respective situations? Each has the head pointing west, and each terminates with a circular enclosure, containing an altar, from which, looking along the most prominent portion of the serpent, the rising sun may ...
— See America First • Orville O. Hiestand

... house, and the boy followed her. Here was my opportunity. The topography of the place was so perfectly suited to the simplest plan of campaign that it may suggest to the suspicious reader a romancist's shift, diaphanous as the "woven wind" of Dacca. Let me repeat, then, that such a flimsy thing is entirely ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy

... in some of the pacified islands. Fourth: His Majesty should be informed how little instruction is given in these islands, the difficulty of many [encomenderos] in furnishing it, and the much greater difficulty which arises from the topography of the country—because it is all islands, and several, or many, of them are so small that they do not allow an entire encomienda, since three hundred, four hundred, or five hundred tributes are not sufficient for the expenses of an encomienda; and many of these have only one hundred ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume VI, 1583-1588 • Emma Helen Blair

... country livings if he would take orders, but he knew that he would find the "insipidity and uniformity" of country life intolerable: and he stayed on to become the greatest of Londoners. There is probably to this day no book, not a professed piece of topography, which mentions the names of so many London streets, squares and churches, as Boswell's Life of Johnson. Many sights that Johnson saw we can still see exactly as he saw them; many, of course, have disappeared; ...
— Dr. Johnson and His Circle • John Bailey

... to Verdun to see the forts, the city, the hills, and the topography of a great battle; I went in the hope of describing with a little of clarity what the operation meant as a military affair. I say, and I shall hereafter try to describe this. But I shall never be able to describe this thing which was the true Verdun for me—these ...
— They Shall Not Pass • Frank H. Simonds

... his mission with his usual alacrity. His forlorn travels of the preceding winter had made him acquainted with the topography of the country, and he reached Snake River without any material difficulty. Here, in an encampment of the natives, he met with six white men, wanderers from the main expedition of Mr. Hunt, who, after having had their respective shares of adventures and mishaps, had fortunately come together ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... Peter made his appearance early. They went out together, spent the day in sightseeing, and, on Malcolm's part chiefly, in learning the topography of London. ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald

... the usual mixture of serious and purely jocular satire, of learning and licence, of jargonic catalogues, of local references to Western France and the general topography of Utopia, this conclusion consists of two main parts—first, a most elaborate description of the Temple, containing underground the Oracle of the Bottle, to which the pilgrims are conducted by a select "Lantern," and of its priestess Bacbuc, its adytum with ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury

... had a commission under Henry VIII. to travel and collect books; his Itinerary is a chief book for English topography. Of Joscelin we shall have occasion ...
— Anglo-Saxon Literature • John Earle

... was going to ask you which of those two girls you had painted it from. The topography was the topography of Miss Maybough, but the landscape was the landscape of Miss Saunders." He waited, as if for Ludlow to speak; then he went on: "I supposed you had been working from some new theory of yours, and I thought I ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells

... as far as I am able, the topography of the mesilla, and described its great wall of circumvallation, I now turn to the ruins which cover its upper surface, starting for their survey from the transverse wall of the old church-yard, 10 m.—33 ft.—north of the church, and proceeding thence northward along ...
— Historical Introduction to Studies Among the Sedentary Indians of New Mexico; Report on the Ruins of the Pueblo of Pecos • Adolphus Bandelier

... short and simple words whenever they will serve your turn. It is a mistake to suppose that a fluent use of long words is a mark either of depth of thought or of extent of information. The following bit of nonsense is taken from the news columns of a newspaper of good standing: "The topography about Puebla avails itself easily to a force which can utilize the heights above the city with cannon." What was meant was probably something like this, "The situation of Puebla is such as to give a great advantage to a force which can plant cannon ...
— Word Study and English Grammar - A Primer of Information about Words, Their Relations and Their Uses • Frederick W. Hamilton

... only given you a simple statement of the facts,' replied Elsie; 'to know our feelings by the way, the delight we experienced, all we learned, including geography and topography, and the life and health we drank in at every step, you must ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various

... several sights and average the angle of slope; to properly lay off the elevation by using the slope scale on the alidade; and finally to put in the contours along these lines of sight on the spot thus allowing for difference in topography between the point of sight and the station from which the elevation is taken. Careful note must be made of the drainage systems as these are the keynotes to the sketch and finally the contours are connected together, keeping in mind always that no contour stops ...
— Military Instructors Manual • James P. Cole and Oliver Schoonmaker

... barrelsful of grape. One grand whir-r-r-r went over us, around us, and, in imagination, through us; it took but the sixtieth part of a minute for fifty men to flatten themselves upon the earth and wish they had never gone to the war. No time was wasted in examining the topography of the position, or in looking for safer quarters, our military discipline showing itself in the unanimity with which we then and there dropped as one man. In the short interval between the first and second discharges of grape, one of those incidents occurred which often turns the seriousness ...
— The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, February, 1886. - The Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 2, February, 1886. • Various

... in the rock surface with the watercourse shown on Viele's map was noted in so many places and the difficulties of construction were so serious at these places, that a section of the map showing the old topography along and adjacent to the station and tunnel lines is reproduced in ...
— Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Vol. LXVIII, Sept. 1910 • Alfred Noble

... historic than strategic advantages, seemed on the face of it as easy as rolling a barrel downhill or eating when hungry. But the level, fertile country was discovered to be very muddy, its supply of rain from heaven unparalleled in nature, its streams as deadly as arsenic, and its topography utterly different from that assigned to it in any known geography. Furthermore, in its woods, and it was nearly all woods, dwelt far more mosquitos than there are lost souls in Hades, and each ...
— Aladdin O'Brien • Gouverneur Morris

... containing 7,500 cavalry, under strict military rule. We were now in a trap, as our pass here ended, and we were near the Federal lines. How to get out of the town was now the problem, and one of the most difficult I had yet met in my study of Rebel topography. We put up at the Crutchfield House, stabled our horses, and sat about in the bar-room, saying nothing to attract attention, but getting all the information possible. I was specially careful not to be recognized. ...
— Thirteen Months in the Rebel Army • William G. Stevenson

... unaccountable for him to pass by, at this time, without any description or comment, the first pitched battle of the Rebellion, he is constrained to pause and view that memorable contest. And first, it may be well to say a word of the general topography of ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan

... about? At this point should come normally the answer in terms of what practically all sociologists agree upon; namely, the three great sets of determining forces or phenomena, the three "controls": (1) the physical environment (climate, topography, natural resources, etc.); (2) man's own nature (psycho-physical factors, the factors in biological evolution, the role of instinct, race, and possibly the concrete problems of immigration and eugenics); (3) social ...
— College Teaching - Studies in Methods of Teaching in the College • Paul Klapper

... he began again, "was very anxious that I should understand the topography of that cabin. I was interested more by its moral atmosphere, that tension of falsehood, of desperate acting, which tainted the pure sea-atmosphere into which the magnanimous Anthony had carried off his conquest ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad

... Suzanne, whose present comical performance was to exercise a great influence in the principal personages of our history, was a work-girl at Madame Lardot's. One word here on the topography of the house. The wash-rooms occupied the whole of the ground floor. The little courtyard was used to hang out on wire cords embroidered handkerchiefs, collarets, capes, cuffs, frilled shirts, cravats, laces, embroidered dresses,—in short, all the fine ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac

... made choice of the first crusade for his theme, and of Godfrey of Boulogne for his hero. Having to deal with historical facts, he studied the best authorities in chronicles, ransacked such books of geography and travel as were then accessible, paid attention to topography, and sought to acquire what we now call local coloring for the details of his poem. Without the sacrifice of truth in any important point, he contrived to give unity to the conduct of his narrative, while interweaving a number of fictitious ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... "I think we had better go forward. I'm not very learned over the topography of the district, but if I'm not much mistaken that round hill or mountain before us is ...
— Patience Wins - War in the Works • George Manville Fenn

... of the Rondout, and thence out to the railroad at the little village of Shokan, an unknown way to them, involving nearly an all-day pull the first day through a pathless wilderness. We ascended to the topmost floor of the tower, and from my knowledge of the topography of the country I pointed out to them their course, and where the valley of the Rondout must lie. The vast stretch of woods, when it came into view from under the foot of Slide, seemed from our point of view very uniform. It swept away to the southeast, rising gently toward the ridge that ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs

... strictly speaking, a line of trenches at all. As usual, each man had dug a hole by himself, and each man was his own architect. Very few holes had been connected by a rough sort of trench at the back. The Captain had described the topography of the situation very exactly. The holes were dug on the borders of the forest, but were concealed from enemy artillery observation by the trees. The field of fire was absolutely open. It stretched to the top of the hill, which formed their horizon, a distance of rather less than two ...
— "Contemptible" • "Casualty"

... well known along the coast, which he searched thoroughly in his trading schooner, doing a brisk business in furs, seal-oil, and skins, and at the same time making frequent metallurgical discoveries and adventurous exploring expeditions. It was said that no man on the coast knew so much of the topography of Labrador, between Hamilton Inlet and the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and a strange adventure opened to him new and startling experiences in the northern central portion of Newfoundland, then, as now, almost ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall

... which matters of importance demand from the prudent. Even its first, or general denomination, was the result of no common research or selection, although, according to the example of my predecessors, I had only to seize upon the most sounding and euphonic surname that English history or topography affords, and elect it at once as the title of my work and the name of my hero. But, alas! what could my readers have expected from the chivalrous epithets of Howard, Mordaunt, Mortimer, or Stanley, or from the softer and more sentimental sounds ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... for it is obvious that where, on rugged mountain sides, ascent or descent can only be practised by the aid of the hands as well as of the feet, the terms for "up" and "down" may be significant of surrounding topography, just as, to reverse the argument, where many meet only to fight, the putting of the fingers of both hands together will mean "collision," instead of its being the more usual sign for "multitude," or ...
— Memoir of William Watts McNair • J. E. Howard

... information,' about which the only difficulty is that Carver, who knew the topography and the chances of a secret messenger arriving to prompt the Jossakeed, does not allude to this theory.[38] He seems to think ...
— The Making of Religion • Andrew Lang

... was often at Court and employed in the king's affairs. Henry II. selected him as a suitable person to accompany the young prince John to Ireland in 1185, and the result was his two great works—"The Topography," and "The Conquest of Ireland," which are the chief and almost the only authorities for Irish history in the Middle Ages. The former work he read publicly at Oxford on his return; it was a great occasion: we must tell it in his own words. "When the work ...
— Mediaeval Wales - Chiefly in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries: Six Popular Lectures • A. G. Little

... The topography of the country must be taken into account. Both valleys, the Miami particularly, are veined with streams tributary to the rivers, and in times of flood the water rises with amazing rapidity and spreads far and wide over the valley ...
— The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado • Logan Marshall

... already been given of the topography and scenery of the wide territory, covering an area about equal to that of the Panjab less the Ambala division, ruled by the Maharaja of Kashmir and Jammu. The population, races, languages, and religions have been referred to ...
— The Panjab, North-West Frontier Province, and Kashmir • Sir James McCrone Douie

... over 40% of GDP; topography and climatic conditions limit cultivated crops to only 5% of land area; cash crops—coffee, sisal, tea, cotton, pyrethrum (insecticide made from chrysanthemums), cashews, tobacco, cloves (Zanzibar); food ...
— The 1990 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... cape. Often I stole up into the attic, or into some unfrequented closet, to escape the noise of the house, while at work. I remember, too, writing sometimes in the barn, on the haymow. The book extended over a wide domestic topography. ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 5, April, 1896 • Various

... horseback riding is comparatively a new thing. He had taken it up a year before—partly because of appeals from me, partly because of changes which he had begun to notice in his topography. Compared with him I was a veteran horseman, for it was then a year and three months since I ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street

... is doubtful if his grandson would have learnt much Latin if Mrs. Lidderdale had not supplemented Horace with the Primer and Henry's Exercises. However, if Mark did not acquire a vocabulary, he greatly enjoyed listening to his grandfather's melodious voice chanting forth that sonorous topography of Horace, while the green windows of the study winked every other minute from the flight past of birds in the garden. His grandfather would stop and ask what bird it was, because he loved birds even better than he loved Horace. And if Mark was tired of Latin he used to say that he wasn't ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie

... informed about the topography and the climatic conditions of the Troad, there can surely be no doubt that he had himself visited Troy. But, as he was there long after its destruction, and its site had moreover been buried deep ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy

... to have a definite place in the Sunday-school curriculum and a boy might far better be informed on the plan of government, the civic dangers, and the line of action for a good man in his own city than to fail of that in an attempt to master the topography of Palestine or to recite perfectly the ...
— The Minister and the Boy • Allan Hoben

... nearly three, years in Syria: his most important geographical discoveries in this country relate to the nature of the district between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Elana; the extent, conformation, and detailed topography of the Haouran; the situation of Apanea on the river Orontes, which was one of the most important cities of Syria under the Macedonian Greeks; the site of Petreea; and the general structure of the peninsula of Mount Sinai. Perhaps the most original and important ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson

... exactly east, and the river lies there;" Ned pursued, confidently; and no one had ever been able to catch him in an error when it came to topography, for the patrol leader had very few equals in studying the lay of the land. "Of course, our canoes lie some little distance above; so that pretty soon we'll begin to shift our line of travel more to the southeast. I have strong hopes that when we do ...
— Boy Scouts on Hudson Bay - The Disappearing Fleet • G. Harvey Ralphson

... passages which treat somewhat fully of the topography of Eastern places by far the most interesting is a description of the Taurus Mountains; but as this text is written in the style of a formal report and, in the original, is associated with certain letters which give us the ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci

... and the same time he was studying the antiquities and the history of Mexico, the character, customs, and language of its people, and taking observations in natural history, physical geography, chemistry, astronomy, and topography. ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne

... other, or farther back where the hill is now cut off. In either case, erosion has carried away its walls and filled up the channel leading from it, and thus obliterated its site. To accomplish this would require a long time; enough to produce a considerable alteration in the topography, and so to predicate for the bottom deposits in the cave an antiquity far beyond the possible appearance of man ...
— Archeological Investigations - Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 76 • Gerard Fowke

... hearts" i.e. impaired digestion. Their souls are at once stowed away in the crops of green birds where they remain till Resurrection Day, "eating of the fruits and drinking of the streams of Paradise," a place however, whose topography is wholly uncertain. Thus the young Prince was rewarded with a manner ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... for, though I am pretty thoroughly acquainted with the topography of the Black Hills country, I had not the least idea that such an enterprise existed in this ...
— Deadwood Dick, The Prince of the Road - or, The Black Rider of the Black Hills • Edward L. Wheeler

... be divided into four classes—topography, trigonometry, naval construction and drawing. The reasons for these you will see from my missions. My tutors were all experts in the Imperial Service. A Secret Service agent sent out to investigate and report on the condition, situation, ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves

... mud- or sand-bottom; the upper parts of tributaries have lower banks and bottoms of gravel, rubble, or bedrock, although a few (such as Cole Creek) have areas of sandy bottom. A fringe forest of deciduous trees occurs along most streams. The topography and geology of the area have been discussed by Todd (1911), Franzen and Leonard ...
— Fishes of the Wakarusa River in Kansas • James E. Deacon

... journey from its original position just outside the orbit of Mercury to this point nearly four hundred and fifty million miles away from the little planet. Winford studied the ground below. He was only partly acquainted with the topography of Callisto and wanted to be sure to pick a spot where Captain Robers and his men could be certain of surviving until help arrived. His eye picked out a satisfactory spot close beside the Gnan River in one of the stunted conifer forests of the planet. Swiftly he dropped the big freighter ...
— The Space Rover • Edwin K. Sloat

... phases of Roman Life: for example, the Roman boy, country life in Italy, the Roman house, traveling, amusements, etc. See W.W. Fowler, Social Life at Rome in the Age of Cicero; H.W. Johnston, The Private Life of the Romans; S.B. Platner, Topography and Monuments of Ancient Rome; T.G. Tucker, Life in the Roman World of Nero and St. Paul. Many phases of Roman life are described ...
— Introductory American History • Henry Eldridge Bourne and Elbert Jay Benton

... to say what changes may have occurred in the topography of the town, during almost a century and a half since Michael Johnson retired from business, and ninety years, at least, since his son's penance was performed. But the church has now merely a street of ordinary width passing around it, while the market-place, ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various

... topography carefully, we attacked the problem at its most available angle and slid from view. We literally dived beneath the brush. For more than two hours we wormed our way down the face of the mountain, crawling like moles at the base of the overhanging thickets of poison oak, wild lilac, chamise, sage, ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope

... and values of these architectural monuments one should consider; first, the history and topography of their environment,—i. e. as to why and when they may have been planned and built; secondly, their personality, as it were,—who were their founders, their patrons, their bishops; thirdly, the functions in which ...
— The Cathedrals of Northern France • Francis Miltoun

... said, turned the paths of old England into roads. Here may be studied the germ of the primal path worn by the tread of the least reflective and least mobile of human beings, the causes of its erratic course, and the transitions by which, with amendments due to the irrefutable facts of topography, it becomes formal and authoritative—a highway for the ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield

... philosophers, mathematicians, and other celebrities; and Cassini determined by actual measurement the relative position of many of the principal objects on the disc, thus laying the foundation of an accurate system of lunar topography; while the labours of T. Mayer and Schroter in the last century, and of Lohrmann, Madler, Neison (Nevill), Schmidt, and other observers in the present, have been mainly devoted to the study of the minuter detail of the moon and ...
— The Moon - A Full Description and Map of its Principal Physical Features • Thomas Gwyn Elger

... he will enter heartily into it, and do it well, it will be as much as he can do for the first number. These transactions contain, amidst a great deal of fanaticism, the most curious information you can imagine upon the history, literature, topography and manners of nations and countries of which we are otherwise totally ignorant.... If you have occasion to write to Southey, pray urge the vast importance of this subject, and entreat him to give it all his ability. I find that a new volume of ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles

... sciences, the progress of knowledge, and of philosophy. He added that Louis XV. was deficient in the quality which Louis XIV. possessed to excess; that is to say, in a good opinion of himself; that he was well-informed; that nobody was more perfectly master of the topography of France; that his opinion in the Council was always the most judicious; and that it was much to be lamented that he had not more confidence in himself, or that he did not rely upon some Minister who enjoyed the confidence ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 2 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe

... Q." (Vol. i., p. 141.) there appeared an article upon the Isle of Dogs, &c., which spoke of the neglected topography of the east of London, and requested information on one or two points. Having felt much interested in this matter, I have endeavoured to obtain information by personal investigation, and send you the following from among ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 203, September 17, 1853 • Various

... Mormon Battalion is one made by Colonel Cooke. Outlined on a map of Arizona, it is printed elsewhere in this work, insofar as it affects this State. The Colonel's map is hardly satisfactory, for only at a few points does he designate locations known today and his topography covers only the district within ...
— Mormon Settlement in Arizona • James H. McClintock

... million years ago there was over a hundred times the land area in this region than exists today. Then the ocean rose. Now all that's left is the mid continent plateau and a few mountain tops. You noted, I suppose, that this is mature topography except for that range of hills to the east. The whole land area at the time of flooding was virtually a peneplain. A rise of a few hundred feet in the ocean level was all that was needed to drown most of ...
— The Lani People • J. F. Bone

... The geography and topography of this sheet are alone a wonder and a study. Glance upon the map. The elements of earth and water seem to have struggled for dominion one over the other. The Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Gulf of Georgia to the south narrow into Admiralty Inlet; the inlet penetrates the very heart of the ...
— Oregon, Washington and Alaska; Sights and Scenes for the Tourist • E. L. Lomax

... particular morning of which I am about to speak, the Confederates were again with us. They were apparently unacquainted with the topography of the surrounding country and were naturally desirous of securing such information as should enable them, in case of necessity, to effect a speedy and secure retreat. We received an early call from several of their officers who inquired the way to the ...
— As I Remember - Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century • Marian Gouverneur

... and classmate at college when a boy in Lexington. After receiving a wound at Cross Keys in June, 1862, when a lieutenant in the Fifty-second Virginia Regiment, which incapacitated him for further service in the infantry, he enlisted in the cavalry. By reason of his familiarity with the topography of the country about Harper's Ferry and the lower portion of the Valley, together with his indomitable pluck and steady nerve, he was often employed as a scout, and in this capacity frequently visited ...
— The Story of a Cannoneer Under Stonewall Jackson • Edward A. Moore

... to make an original plan for the Federal City, adapted to the topography, but he endeavored to secure ideas from plans of great cities of Europe that might be found possible of adaptation so he wrote to Jefferson who sent his notable reply and plans of a number of cities that he had secured evidently while our minister ...
— A Portrait of Old George Town • Grace Dunlop Ecker

... compelled to rise to his feet to escape being trampled upon. Teddy caught the outlines of a tall form tearing hurriedly through the wood, as if in terror of being caught, and he bent all his energies toward overtaking him. The gloom of the night, that had now fairly descended, and the peculiar topography of the ground, made it an exceedingly difficult matter for both to keep their feet. The fugitive, catching in some obstruction, was thrown flat upon his face, but quickly recovered himself. Teddy, with a shout of exultation, sprung forward, confident that he had secured their persecutor at ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis

... them, please. I know the topography of that district perfectly, but I am not familiar with the holdings ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne

... any longer on the scene of his collapse and defeat, and went towards the Palais Royal. He did not know the topography of his quarter yet, and was obliged to ask his way. Then he went to Very's and ordered dinner by way of an initiation into the pleasures of Paris, and a solace for his discouragement. A bottle of Bordeaux, ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac

... fishing-village asleep between two hills. He told her how the new town had been built northward and westward, in the days of the great Monypenny, whose statue now stares blindly out to sea. He was a man naturally interested in topography and generally "read up" the places he visited, but he had never before found a woman who cared to listen to ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith

... Mandingo camp. The enterprising character, intelligence, and courage of Laing led to his being chosen by the governor as his envoy, and on the 7th January, 1822, he received instructions to report on the manufactures and topography of the provinces mentioned, and to ascertain the feeling of the inhabitants ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part III. The Great Explorers of the Nineteenth Century • Jules Verne

... school, the famous "little red school-house" of the nineteenth century, was frequently the neighborhood center and the school district commonly formed a neighborhood area, particularly in hilly sections where its lines were adjusted by topography. A recent study of neighborhood areas in Otsego County, New York, shows that about half of them are identical with the school districts, chiefly on account of topography, while in Dane County, Wisconsin, more neighborhood areas are determined ...
— The Farmer and His Community • Dwight Sanderson

... the controls who have been instrumental in giving the information about Mars, the purpose of these clairvoyant pictures was to give the compiler of this book real visual evidence as to life on Mars; and in particular, real pictures setting forth its topography, which could be elucidated ...
— The Planet Mars and its Inhabitants - A Psychic Revelation • Eros Urides and J. L. Kennon

... convenient headland, as if fearful lest some fruitful region or precious mine might be overlooked, should a single break occur in the line of survey. Yet it should be remembered, that, though the true point of Pizarro's destination is obvious to us, familiar with the topography of these countries, he was wandering in the dark, feeling his way along, inch by inch, as it were, without chart to guide him, without knowledge of the seas or of the bearings of the coast, and even with no better defined idea of the object at which he aimed ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott

... the time. I knew that Floyd was in command, but he was no soldier, and I judged that he would yield to Pillow's pretensions. I met, as I expected, no opposition in making the reconnoissance and, besides learning the topography of the country on the way and around Fort Donelson, found that there were two roads available for marching; one leading to the village of Dover, the other ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... a book which has been appearing in monthly numbers during the year, and in which form we have several times noticed it with warm approval. It is full of interesting matter to read, and adorned with upwards of one hundred engravings, of admirable execution, illustrative of natural history, topography, juvenile science, costumes, and sports, drawn by ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 186, May 21, 1853 • Various

... million kWh produced, 20 kWh per capita (1991) Industries: primarily agricultural processing (sugar, beer, cigarettes, sisal twine), diamond and gold mining, oil refinery, shoes, cement, textiles, wood products, fertilizer Agriculture: accounts for over 58% of GDP; topography and climatic conditions limit cultivated crops to only 5% of land area; cash crops - coffee, sisal, tea, cotton, pyrethrum (insecticide made from chrysanthemums), cashews, tobacco, cloves (Zanzibar); food crops - corn, wheat, cassava, bananas, fruits, vegetables; small numbers ...
— The 1993 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... day, they can see from this coast Hy Brysail or the Enchanted Island, the paradise of the Pagan Irish, and concerning which they relate a number of romantic stories",—Beaufort's "Ancient Topography of Ireland." ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al

... geographical discoveries of our traveller, are the nature of the country between the Dead Sea and the gulf of Aelana, now Akaba;— the extent, conformation, and detailed topography of the Haouran;—the site of Apameia on the Orontes, one of the most important cities of Syria under the Macedonian Greeks;—the site of Petra, which, under the Romans, gave the name of Arabia Petraea to the surrounding ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt

... association on this subject, and keep in mind that somewhere north of the home of the parent trees, is a line north of which these trees will not bear. This line is dependent upon several things, altitude, topography and other elements. As an example, I merely mention that orange orchards flourish in ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Fourteenth Annual Meeting • Various

... over the map, the reader will perceive the topography of the country. Fifty miles north from us were the forks of the Nu-eleje-sha-wako river, towards which the Umbiquas were going, to be near to water, and also to fall upon the path from the settlement to the post. Thus they would intercept any messenger, in case their ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat

... thus finished his account of the topography of the route to the Wengern Alp, went away from the window and returned to the table where he had been employed in writing some letters just before Rollo had come in. Rollo was left at the window. He leaned his arms ...
— Rollo in Switzerland • Jacob Abbott

... which its windows projected, adorned with spandrel tops that were richly sculptured. The roof itself was edged with a sort of balustrade, concealing the gutters for the rain water which gargoyles in the form of crocodile's heads discharged into the street. The young seigneur, after studying this topography as carefully as a cat, believed he could make his way from the tower to the roof, and thence to Madame de Vallier's by the gutters and the help of a gargoyle. But he did not count on the narrowness of the loopholes ...
— Maitre Cornelius • Honore de Balzac

... world, indeed, that is organized at all, has been organized with a view to stability within territorial limits; no country has been organized with any foresight of development and inevitable change, or with the slightest reference to the practical revolution in topography that the new means of transit involve. And since this is so, and since humanity is most assuredly embarked upon a series of changes of which we know as yet only the opening phases, a large part ...
— Anticipations - Of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon - Human life and Thought • Herbert George Wells

... unless it be that the author speaks slightingly of second-sight, a subject for which Johnson always had a strong hankering. In 1773 Johnson paid a visit to Mr. Macaulay, who by that time had removed to Calder, and began the interview by congratulating him on having produced "a very pretty piece of topography,"—a compliment which did not seem to the taste of the author. The conversation turned upon rather delicate subjects, and, before many hours had passed, the guest had said to the host one of the very rudest things recorded by Boswell! Later on in the same evening he atoned for his incivility ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan

... Antiquarian or Literary Pursuits, that he is prepared to undertake searches among the Public Records, MSS. in the British Museum, Ancient Wills, or other Depositories of a similar Nature, in any Branch of Literature, History, Topography, Genealogy, or the like, and in which he has ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 217, December 24, 1853 • Various

... had carried the canoes around and embarked on the lower side they passed the mouth of the real Otter Run. This enabled Ned to fix their bearings definitely on the map, and he resolved to keep close track of the topography of the creek ...
— Canoe Boys and Campfires - Adventures on Winding Waters • William Murray Graydon

... it was so. There was nothing for it but to stop at the nearest house, give the horses a rest and a feed, and make a fresh start, - better informed as to our topography. ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke

... formed only a portion of the course. Subjects which are now considered essential to a military education were not taught at all. The art of war gave place to ethics and engineering; and mathematics and chemistry were considered of far more importance than topography and fortification. Yet with French, history, and drawing, it will be admitted that the course was sufficiently comprehensive. No cadet was permitted to graduate unless he had reached a high standard of proficiency. Failures were numerous. In the four ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson

... considerable body of water, just now in full depth, which runs down ... to the Mediterranean which it enters by a small elevation called the calf's hill." One sympathises with the difficulties of a man who sets out to write of the topography of any part of the world in which there may be fighting as if he was personally familiar with it—and the calf's hill (of which we, who were on the spot, had never heard) was a fine touch. But surely it might have struck Mr. Belloc that if the wadi—in point of fact bone dry—had ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison

... military rule. Of the botany, zoology, geology, not to mention the topography, of her American possessions, the officials of Spain knew nothing save from the ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard

... stream, formed the Elysian Fields, the abodes of the souls of heroes and of poets. [Footnote: These conceptions, it will be understood, belong to the early period of Greek mythology. As the geographical knowledge of the Greeks became more extended, they modified considerably the topography not only of the upper- world, but ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers

... began to roam about the place, prowling along the slopes and following the stream. Apparently the topography satisfied him; for after a little while he came back to where Miss Erith was lying on the moss, one arm resting across ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers

... it is remarkable—almost, indeed, a gallery in itself, comprising as it does portraiture, design, topography, and the delineation of one of the most spirited episodes in religious history. After the magic words "One Pound," it is, of course, to St. George and the Dragon that the eye first turns. What Mr. Ruskin would say of the latest version of the encounter between England's ...
— A Boswell of Baghdad - With Diversions • E. V. Lucas

... of perversity seems to have entered into the very topography of this quarter. They turned up the rue Bienville (up is toward the river); reaching the levee, they took their course up the shore of the Mississippi (almost due south), and broke into a lively gallop on the ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable

... the forest between these two points; and this is what is considered by some travellers as one of the savage "instincts," whereas it is merely the result of wide general knowledge. The man knew the topography of the whole district; the slope of the land, the direction of the streams, the belts of bamboo or rattan, and many other indications of locality and direction; and he was thus enabled to hit straight upon the hut, in the vicinity of which he had ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace

... of "adaptive radiation," which links on to Darwin's law of divergence,[553] constitutes a brilliant vindication of the functional point of view. "According to this law each isolated region, if large and sufficiently varied in its topography, soil, climate, and vegetation, will give rise to a diversified mammalian fauna. From primitive central types branches will spring off in all directions, with teeth and prehensile organs modified to take advantage ...
— Form and Function - A Contribution to the History of Animal Morphology • E. S. (Edward Stuart) Russell

... to Choricius, so long as the Epidamnus of Thucydides was at hand; and if the task of narrating our Peloponnesian war were assigned to the ghost of Choricius, I have no doubt that he would open it with a description of Charleston in terms of Epidamnus. Little matters of topography would not trouble such an one. To the sophist an island is an island, a river a river, a height a height, everywhere. Sphacteria would furnish the model for Morris Island; the Achelous would serve indifferently for Potomac or Mississippi, the ...
— The Creed of the Old South 1865-1915 • Basil L. Gildersleeve

... his nation; and excited the just indignation of all towards his inhuman and barbarous murderers." The strong native powers of his mind had been more enriched by observation, travel and intercourse with the whites, than is usual among the Indian chiefs. He was familiarly acquainted with the topography and geography of the north-west, even beyond the Mississippi river, and possessed an accurate knowledge of the various treaties between the whites and the Indian tribes of this region, and the relative rights ...
— Life of Tecumseh, and of His Brother the Prophet - With a Historical Sketch of the Shawanoe Indians • Benjamin Drake

... such as is now generally employed in the New England States. This is the only salmon net in use at Islesboro and in some other sections. The local and individual variations in the form of the nets depend on the topography of the bottom and shore and the habits of the salmon, and are the result of ...
— The Salmon Fishery of Penobscot Bay and River in 1895-96 • Hugh M. Smith

... of the settlement there are faint traces of what may have been an irrigating ditch, but the topography is such that water could not be brought on top of the mesa from the river itself. At the southern end of the settlement, northeast of the point shown in the illustration, there are traces of a structure that may have been a storage reservoir. ...
— Aboriginal Remains in Verde Valley, Arizona • Cosmos Mindeleff

... does not exhibit everywhere the same features. The topography of the Ile de France is so varied that one can distinguish several families, or groups, of landscapes between the Marne and the Vesle. Let us follow them, in the order followed by the different stages ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various

... [Greek: chora], a tract of country, and [Greek: graphein], to write), a description or delineation on a map of a district or tract of country; it is to be distinguished from "geography" and "topography," which treat of the earth as a whole and of particular places respectively. The word is common in old geographical treatises, but is now superseded by the wider use of "topography." (2) (From the Gr. [Greek: choros], dance), the art of dancing, or ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various

... should say it was just possible that he might consider his own lot to have been more or less like that which he forecasts for Astyanax, the infant son of Hector. At any rate his intimate acquaintance with the topography of Troy, which is now well ascertained, and still more his obvious attempt to excuse the non-existence of a great wall which, according to his story, ought to be there and which he knew had never ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler

... triangulation having been made, the topography is executed by a variety of methods, adapted to the peculiar conditions found in various portions of the country. To a large extent the plane-table is used. In the hands of the topographers of the Geological Survey, the plane-table is not simply a portable draughting table for the field; ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 484, April 11, 1885 • Various



Words linked to "Topography" :   topographic, geography, geographics, shape, topographical, contour, conformation, configuration, form, topology



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